(  \f*  1C 

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HENRY   HOLT  &  CO.,  PUBLISHERS,  NEW  YORK. 


HISTORY  OF 


FROM  THE  FALL  OF  CONSTANTINOPLE 
TO  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION 


VICTOR  DURUY 


TRANSLATED   AND   REVISED,  WITH   NOTES   BY 

EDWIN    A.    GROSVENOR 

Professor  of  French  in  Amherst  College  and  Professor  of  History  in 

Smith  College,  and  formerly  Professor  of  History  in 

Robert  College,  Constantinople 


NEW  YORK 

HENRY   HOLT  AND  COMPANY 

1894 


COPYRIGHT,  1894, 

BY 
HENRY   HOLT  &  CO. 


THE   MERSHON   COMPANY   PRESS, 
RAHWAY,  N.  J. 


EDITOR'S  PREFACE. 


MONSIEUR  DURUY'S  "  Histoire  des  Temps  Modernes  " 
is  unique.  His  skill  and  comprehensive  grasp  are  equally 
manifest  in  what  he  has  omitted  and  in  the  vivid  promi- 
nence given  to  what  is  most  essential.  President  C.  K. 
Adams  says  of  this  book  in  his  "Manual  of  Historical 
Literature":  "It  is  doubtful  whether  any  other  single 
volume  on  the  period  of  which  it  treats  can  be  of  so  much 
value  to  the  student."  A  work  thus  guaranteed  needs  no 
further  credential.  But  it  is  of  interest  that  its  author  is 
one  of  the  foremost  contemporary  French  writers  ;  that  he 
was  for  years  Minister  of  Public  Instruction  in  France ;  and 
that  no  foreigner  has  better  appreciated  or  more  admired 
those  grand  political  ideas  which  underlie  our  national  insti- 
tutions and  dominate  our  national  life. 

This  work  traces  the  gradual  elaboration  of  principles 
which  on  this  side  the  ocean  have  attained  their  fullest 
development.  Moreover,  it  is  well  for  us  Americans  to 
gaze  sometimes  upon  the  processional  march  of  trans- 
atlantic events  from  a  continental  standpoint,  and  not,  as  we 
commonly  do,  through  the  medium  of  insular  and  British 
eyes.  Thus  only  can  our  education  become  broad  and 
cosmopolitan  as  it  ought  to  be. 

By  rendering  this  compendium  more  accessible  one  con- 
tributes to  the  pursuit  of  studies  which  are  inspiring  in 
themselves  and  most  beneficent  in  their  results.  I  espe- 
cially thank  my  colleagues  Professors  Frink,  Genung,  and 
Todd  for  suggestions  and  information  which  have  been 
invaluable  in  the  accomplishment  of  this  task. 

EDWIN  A.  GROSVENOR, 
AMHERST,  May  j/, 


AUTHOR'S  PREFACE. 


THIS  volume  contains  the  history  in  general  of  the 
European  states  from  1453  to  1789,  that  is  to  say,  from  the 
close  of  the  Middle  Ages  to  the  commencement  of  contem- 
poraneous history.  Upon  the  three  and  a  half  centuries 
which  preceded  1789  we  can  now  pronounce  consummatum 
est.  The  French  Revolution,  which  tends  more  and  more  to 
become  a  European  revolution,  separates  the  utterly  dead 
old  regime  from  the  new  regime  inaugurated  by  the  grand 
leaders  of  the  Constitutional  Assembly. 

The  Middle  Ages  had  been  characterized  by  the  prepon- 
derance of  local  powers,  and  by  the  most  complete  develop- 
ment of  individual  energies,  at  least  among  the  lords  of 
feudalism  and  the  burgesses  of  the  communes.  The  dis- 
tinguishing feature  of  Modern  Times  is  found  in  the  pre- 
ponderance of  the  central  power,  or  the  absolute  authority 
of  the  kings,  and  in  state  action  substituted  for  that  of  com- 
munities. 

But  while  the  power  and  political  life  of  the  nations  were 
concentrated  in  the  hands  of  their  chiefs,  intelligence,  by  a 
contrary  effort  breaking  its  fetters,  was  diffused  everywhere 
and  upon  all.  The  revolution  was  the  struggle  of  these 
two  opposing  forces.  So  their  reconciliation — that  of  social 
order  with  liberty,  or  the  development  of  individual  activity 
and  individual  rights  conjointly  with  the  strength  of  the 
state — is  the  problem  of  our  age,  and  will  be  the  dominant 
characteristic  of  future  society. 

I  do  not  claim  to  include  in  this  volume  all  even  of  the 
prominent  facts  which  have  been  produced  from  1453  to  1789, 
but  only  to  give  a  rapid  sketch  of  European  life  in  general, 
and  of  those  momentous  events  which  permit  us  to  trace  its 
progressive  march. 


VI  AUTHOR'S  PREFACE. 

The  word  revolution  occurs  often  in  these  pages.  It  is 
because  I  know  no  other  to  express  those  modifications  which 
are  continually  operating  in  the  life  of  nations.  Science  has 
demonstrated  that  there  is  not  one  of  our  organs  whose 
elements  are  not  in  a  brief  space  of  time  completely 
replaced.  If  the  human  body  is  thus  the  theater  of  an 
incessant  renovation  and  transformation,  what  must  that 
not  be  which  is  accomplished  at  the  heart  of  that  social 
order  on  which  so  many  influences  exert  their  powerful 
action  ? 

There  are  persons  whom  the  mere  word  revolution 
appalls.  Let  us  have  none  of  those  childish  terrors  ;  let  us 
look  everything  in  its  face,  and  we  shall  behold  the  mena- 
cing phantom  transform  itself  into  a  prudent  and  necessary 
counselor.  Why  should  that  word  which  serves  to  indicate 
eternal  wisdom  when  describing  celestial  motion  become 
a  cause  of  terror  when  used  to  represent  the  general  move- 
ments of  the  moral  world  ? 

The  History  of  Modern  Times,  beheld  I  dare  not  say 
from  above,  but  from  a  distance,  is  summed  up  in  a  small 
number  of  dominant  facts.  The  rest  is  episodic. 

First,  there  is  the  political  revolution  which  intrusts  to 
the  hand  of  kings  the  authority  formerly  wielded  by  the 
lords ;  its  inevitable  consequence  is  found  in  great  foreign 
wars.  The  kings  in  truth  do  not  resist  the  temptation 
of  employing  for  their  personal  ambition  the  national 
forces  which  they  control.  Charles  VIII.,  Louis  XII.,  and 
Francis  I.  seek  beyond  the  Alps  crowns  which  others  seize  ; 
and  the  result  of  the  first  Italian  wars  is  the  predominance 
of  Spain  and  of  the  house  of  Austria  upon  the  peninsula. 

While  the  kings  wrestle  with  each  other  along  their 
frontiers,  Christopher  Columbus,  Raphael,  Copernicus, 
Rabelais,  and  the  predecessors  of  Bacon  and  Descartes 
unveil  new  worlds.  Maritime  commerce  is  born  among  the 
western  nations ;  the  precious  metals  by  their  sudden 
abundance  produce  effects  analogous  to  those  of  which  we 
ourselves  are  witnesses,  and  personal  property  is  amassed 
in  the  hands  of  plebeians.  The  arts,  letters,  sciences,  and 
philosophy  are  transformed  :  in  a  word  there  is  the  revolu- 
tion, or,  as  the  men  of  the  sixteenth  century  called  it  by  an 
expressive  and  charming  name,  the  Renaissance,  which  is 
wrought  in  ideas  and  interests  as  it  is  wrought  in  politics, 
and  which  is  brought  about  even  in  creeds. 


AUTHOR'S  PREFACE.  Vll 

But  the  vanquished  past  is  restive  under  its  defeat ;  feu- 
dalism seeks  a  new  life  in  making  use  of  Protestantism. 
Though  it  fails  in  France,  where,  under  the  bloody  ruins 
piled  up  by  religious  wars,  Henry  IV.  finds  again  the  rights 
and  the  authority  of  Francis  I.,  it  succeeds  in  Germany, 
where  the  peace  of  Augsburg,  prelude  to  the  treaties  of 
Westphalia,  consecrates  the  independence  of  the  princes 
and  the  ruin  of  imperial  authority. 

At  the  same  time  by  the  Council  of  Trent  and  by  the 
creation  of  the  Jesuit  order  the  Catholics  determine  at  the 
heart  of  the  Church  a  movement  of  concentration  akin  to 
that  accomplished  in  social  order.  The  absolute  authority 
of  the  pontifical  monarchy  is  founded  ;  protesting  against 
the  new  spirit,  Rome  at  last  assumes  the  arms  of  austerity 
and  discipline.  At  the  service  of  the  Catholic  restoration 
Philip  II.  places  the  treasures  of  the  New  World  and  his 
veteran  Spanish  troops.  The  great  battle  of  creeds  is 
joined,  but  the  victory  is  won  by  the  ideas  of  toleration 
represented  by  Henry  IV.  Spain  declines  and  France 
ascends. 

During  the  second  half  of  the  sixteenth  century  every- 
thing had  taken  on  a  religious  form  :  the  democratic  aspira- 
tions of  the  great  cities  were  called  the  Holy  League  ;  the 
desires  for  independence  of  the  provincial  nobility,  Calvin- 
ism ;  the  kings  were  by  turns  on  one  side  or  the  other. 
In  the  seventeenth  everything  became  again  political. 
Richelieu,  a  state  cardinal,  as  the  Pope  in  disdain  entitled 
that  priest,  who  was  the  ally  of  the  Protestant  powers,  was 
its  highest  expression,  and  thanks  to  him  the  preponderance 
exercised  by  the  house  of  Austria  passed  to  the  house  of 
Bourbon. 

But  Louis  XIV.  commits  the  same  fault  as  Charles  V. 
and  Philip  II.  in  undertaking  for  his  own  account  their 
ambitious  projects.  He  abandons  the  traditional  policy  of 
France,  that  of  Francis  I.,  of  Henry  II.,  of  Henry  IV.,  and 
of  Richelieu  ;  he  repudiates  the  Protestant  alliances  ;  he 
exhausts  his  kingdom  to  dominate  Europe  in  the  name  of 
his  dynasty,  which  he  renders  usurping,  and  in  the  name  of 
Catholicism,  which  he  renders  persecuting  ;  and  he  descends 
to  the  tomb  as  sad  as  the  mighty  vanquished  of  the  pre- 
ceding age,  discrowned  of  his  glory,  with  the  grief  of  see- 
ing new  stars  climb  the  horizon  which  eclipse  his  own.  To 
Louis  XIV.  is  due  the  greatness  of  Prussia  and  England. 


Vlll  AUTHOR'S  PREFACE. 

In  the  eighteenth  century  France  descends  still  lower. 
At  Rossbach  she  seems  to  lose  even  her  military  qualities, 
and  is  as  destitute  of  great  generals  as  of  great  bishops  and 
great  ministers  of  state.  Another  power  of  former  times, 
even  Austria,  has  the  same  fate  as  France.  In  Germany 
she  loses  a  vast  and  opulent  province,  in  Italy  a  kingdom  ; 
then  by  a  strange  overturning  of  political  ideas  those  two 
irreconcilable  enemies,  who  for  two  hundred  years  disputed 
the  supremacy  against  each  other,  unite  without  being  able 
to  regain  their  military  honor  or  restore  their  compromised 
fortune. 

In  the  presence  of  these  venerable  monarchies,  which 
decline  in  consequence  of  their  errors,  young  and  valiant 
states  grow  strong  through  the  skill  of  their  leaders,  the 
devotion  of  their  peoples,  or  the  virtue  of  their  free  institu- 
tions. 

Prussia  under  Frederick  II.  doubles  her  resources  and 
becomes  conscious  of  her  strength  ;  under  Peter  the  Great 
and  Catherine  II.  Russia  is  born,  and  speedily  casts  her 
threatening  shadow  over  the  eastern  half  of  Europe  ;  Eng- 
land at  last  grasps  the  scepter  of  the  seas,  while  time  solid- 
ifies her  successful  revolution  of  1688,  and  she  accomplishes 
the  task  of  the  coalition  which  was  roused  against  France 
by  the  disastrous  ambition  of  Louis  XIV.;  moreover,  she 
banishes  from  almost  all  the  two  Indies  the  flag  of  the 
French. 

But,  like  the  Hapsburgs  and  the  Bourbons,  she  misuses 
her  victory.  She  claims  upon  the  seas  the  supremacy  which 
Philip  II.  and  Louis  XIV.  sought  upon  the  Continent,  and 
against  her  the  coalition  is  renewed  ;  her  colonies  revolt ; 
under  the  thunderclap  of  1789  which  revolutionizes  every- 
thing maritime  despotism  is  compromised  just  as  continental 
despotism  had  been  broken. 

The  triumph  of  the  English  colonie's  on  the  other  side  of 
the  Atlantic  had  a  far  other  reach  than  the  victors  them- 
selves believed.  It  was  not  only  American  independence 
which  the  starry  flag  bore  in  its  folds  ;  it  was  the  harbinger  of 
a  commercial  policy  which  was  to  produce  a  new  revolution 
in  the  economical  interests  of  the  world.  Resultant  of  the 
victory  of  Washington  there  was  a  future  which  is  the  pres- 
ent to-day,  the  abolition  of  monopolies,  of  the  slave  trade, 
and  of  the  colonial  system,  whose  vigorous  formula  had  been 
drawn  up  by  Colbert  and  the  Long  Parliament.  Freedom 


AUTHOR'S  PREFACE.  IX 

of  colonial  commerce  and  of  the  seas  found  its  germ  in  the 
liberty  of  the  revolutionists  in  America. 

While  beyond  the  ocean  a  new  people  arose,  in  the  midst 
of  our  aged  continent  a  people,  ancient,  heroic,  necessary, 
was  blotted  from  the  roll  of  nations.  Poland  was  invaded 
and  dismembered  ;  Prussia,  Russia,  and  Austria  shared  its 
bloody  fragments.  Herein  was  a  political  crime  which 
caused  torrents  of  blood  and  tears  to  flow,  the  fountains  of 
which  are  not  yet  dry. 

England  and  France  allowed  the  tragedy  to  be  accom- 
plished, absorbed  as  were  both  by  the  American  war,  which 
was  drawing  nigh  ;  the  latter  by  the  intellectual  agitation, 
which  was  become  formidable. 

France  in  the  eighteenth  century  had  regained  in  letters 
the  influence  she  had  lost  in  war.  Nations  no  longer 
dominated  by  her  arms  submitted  to  the  influence  of  her 
mind.  Her  conquerors  even  spoke  her  language,  read  her 
books,  and  were  subdued  by  her  ideas.  What  mattered  it 
to  Voltaire  that  France  lost  Canada  ;  to  Buffon,  to  Diderot, 
to  d'Alembert,  to  the  philosophers  and  literary  men  of  the 
age,  that  the  Russians  marched  to  Constantinople  and  the 
Prussians  to  Warsaw  ?  They  had  another  task  than  to  be 
anxious  for  the  fate  of  a  province,  even  of  an  empire. 
They  sought  for  man,  believed  they  had  found  him,  and 
meant  to  make  of  him  a  citizen.  They  studied  society,  be- 
lieved it  ill  built,  and  desired  its  reconstruction.  There 
was  a  civilization  to  recast.  For  workmen  so  ardently  em- 
ployed at  such  a  task  what  mattered  the  sound  of  a  stone 
which  was  detached  from  the  old  edifice  and  fell  ! 

Those  even  whom  they  seemed  to  threaten  listened  to 
them  with  deference.  The  monarchs  paid  court  to  those 
men  of  mind.  Everywhere  the  kings  experimented  with 
their  ideas,  and  despite  the  wars  an  effort  at  reformation 
was  made  from  one  end  to  the  other  of  Europe.  It  was 
felt  that  in  the  bosom  of  modern  society  there  existed  a 
profound  disagreement  ;  that  in  political  institutions  they 
were  still  far  in  the  past,  while  through  ideas  they  lived  in 
the  future.  The  princes  wished  to  re-establish  harmony. 
For  the  economists  they  developed  highways,  canals,  agri- 
culture ;  for  Beccaria  and  Montesquieu  they  tempered  the 
penal  laws  and  on  many  points  ameliorated  legislation  ;  for 
Voltaire  they  spoke  of  toleration,  banished  the  Jesuits, 
diminished  the  number  of  monasteries,  and  sought  the  pub- 


X  AUTHOR'S  PREFACE. 

lie  welfare.  But  they  were  still  seeking,  and  already  some, 
like  Joseph  II.,  had  died  in  their  labor  ;  others,  like  Charles 
IV.  and  Ferdinand  IV.,  were  falling  back  into  the  old 
repose,  when  the  dike  disastrously  built  up  in  France 
against  legitimate  desires,  and  behind  which  the  great 
waters  were  heaped  together,  gave  way  and  everything  was 
swept  headlong  by  the  furious  torrent. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

EDITOR'S  PREFACE, Hi 

AUTHOR'S  PREFACE, * .        .  v 


Bool?  first 

REVOLUTION  IN    THE  POLITICAL    'ORDER,  OR 

DEFINITIVE  RUIN  OF  THE  POLITICAL 

INSTITUTIONS    OF   THE  MIDDLE 

AGES,  AND  A  NEW  SYSTEM 

OF  GOVERNMENT. 


CHAPTER   I. 

STATE  OF  EUROPE  AT  THE  MIDDLE  OF  THE  FIFTEENTH  CENTURY. 

The  Boundary  between  the  Middle   Ages   and   Modern  Times. — 

Western  Europe. — Northern,  Eastern,  and  Central  States,         .       I 

CHAPTER   II. 
FRANCE  FROM  1453  TO  1494. 

Progress  of  the  Royal  Authority  during  the  Last  Years  of  Charles 
VII.— Louis  XI.  (1461-83).— League  of  Public  Welfare  (1465). 
— Interview  of  Peronne  (1468). — Ambition  and  Death  of 
the  Duke  of  Burgundy  (1477). — Ruin  of  the  Great  Feudal 
Houses.— Death  of  Louis  XI.  (1483).— Reign  of  Charles  VIII. 
until  the  Italian  Expedition  (1483-94),  ....  8 

CHAPTER   III. 
ENGLAND  FROM  1453  TO  1509. 

State  of  England  at  the  Middle  of  the  Fifteenth  Century. — War  of 
the  Roses  (1455-85). — Henry  VII.,  Tudor  (1485-1509). — Sup- 
pression of  Public  Liberties,  .  .  .  .  .  .  .27 


x'l  CONTEXTS. 

CHAPTER   IV. 
SPAIN  FROM  1453  TO  1521. 

PAGE 

State  of  Spain  at  the  Middle  of  the  Fifteenth  Century. — Navarre, 

Aragon,  and  Castile. — Portugal, 39 

CHAPTER   V. 
GERMANY  AND  ITALY  FROM  1453  TO  1494. 

Divisions  of  Germany  and  Italy. — The  Emperors  Frederick  III.  and 
Maximilian. — Italy  in  the  Second  Part  of  the  Fifteenth  Cen- 
tury,   51 

CHAPTER  VI. 

THE  OTTOMAN  EMPIRE  FROM  1453  TO  1520. 
Mohammed  II.  (1451-81). — Ba'iezid  II.  and  Selim  I.  (1481-1520),        67 


Boofe  Seconfc. 

CONSEQUENCES  OF   THE   POLITICAL  REVO- 
LUTION.—FIRST  EUROPEAN 
WARS  (1494-1559). 


CHAPTER   VII. 
THE  ITALIAN  WARS  (1494-1516). 

the  Preceding  Period. — Expedition  of  Charles  VIII.  into 
Italy  (1494). — Louis  XII.  (1498-1515). — New  Conquest  of  the 
Milanais  by  Francis  I.  (1515), 75 

CHAPTER   VIII. 

THE  FIRST  PERIOD  OF  RIVALRY  BETWEEN  THE  HOUSES  OF 
FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA  (1519-29). 

Francis   I.    and   Charles   V. — First  War  (1521-25). — Second   War 

(1526-29). — Treaty  of  Cambrai,         .          .          .          .         .         .     91 


CONTENTS.  Xlll 

CHAPTER    IX. 

THE  SECOND  PERIOD  OF  RIVALRY  BETWEEN  THE  HOUSES 
OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA.— INTERVENTION  OF  TURKEY 
AND  ENGLAND  (1529-47). 

PAGE 

New  System  of  French  Alliances. — Charles  V.  before  Tunis  and 
Algiers. — Third  War  with  France  (1536-38). — Fourth  War 
(1542-44), 99 

CHAPTER   X. 

THE  THIRD  PERIOD  OF  RIVALRY  BETWEEN  THE  HOUSES 
OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA  (1547-59). 

Supremacy  of  Charles  V. — Fifth  War  against  France  (1547-56). — 
Last  Struggle  for  Italian  Independence. — Treaty  of  Cateau- 
Cambresis  (1559),  ....  ....  109 


3Boofe 

REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS,  IDEAS,  AND  CREEDS. 

CHAPTER   XI. 

THE  ECONOMIC  REVOLUTION,  OR  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA 
AND  OF  THE  PASSAGE  TO  INDIA. 

First  Maritime  Discoveries. — Vasco  da  Gama  (1497)  and  the  Colon- 
ial Empire  of  the  Portuguese. — Christopher  Columbus  (1492). — 
Cortes  (1519). — Magellan  (1520). — Pizarro  (1529). — Colonial 
Empire  of  the  Spaniards. — Consequences  of  the  New  Discoveries. 
— Introduction  of  Posts  and  of  Canals  with  Locks,  .  .  .  118 

CHAPTER   XII. 

REVOLUTION  IN  LETTERS,  ARTS,  AND  SCIENCES,  OR  THE 
RENAISSANCE. 

Invention  of  Printing. — Renaissance   of   Letters. — Renaissance  of 

Arts. — Renaissance  of  Sciences, 138 

CHAPTER   XIII. 
REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS,  OR  THE  REFORMATION. 

State  of  the  Clergy  in  the  Sixteenth  Century. — Luther  :  The  Refor- 
mation in  Germany  and  in  the  Scandinavian  States  (1517-55). 


xiv  CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Zwingli  and  Calvin  :  The  Reformation  in  Switzerland,  France, 
the  Netherlands,  and  Scotland  (1517-59). — The  Reformation 
in  England  (1531-62). — Principal  Differences  among  the 
Protestant  Churches,  160 


3Boofe  jFourtb.. 

THE   CATHOLIC  RESTORATION  AND    THE 
RELIGIO  US  WA  RS.  —PREPONDER- 
ANCE  OF  SPAIN. 

CHAPTER   XIV. 
THE  COUNCIL  OF  TRENT  AND  THE  CATHOLIC  RESTORATION. 

Reforms  at  the  Pontifical  Court  and  Attempts  at  Reconciliation  with 
the  Protestants. — Defensive  Measures :  The  Inquisition,  the 
Index,  the  Jesuits. — Council  of  Trent  (1545-63),  .  .  .  189 

CHAPTER   XV. 
THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98). 

The  Catholic  Chiefs  and  the  Protestant  Chiefs. — Struggle  of  the  two 
Religions  in  the  Netherlands  ;  Formation  of  the  Republic  of 
the  United  Provinces  (1566-1609). — Struggle  of  the  two  Reli- 
gions in  England ;  Elizabeth  and  Mary  Stuart  ;  the  Great 
Armada  (1559-1588). — Religious  Wars  in  France  (1562-98),  201 

CHAPTER   XVI. 

CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  IN  FRANCE,  SPAIN, 
ENGLAND,  AND  HOLLAND. 

Decline  and  Ruin  of  Spain. — Prosperity  of  England  and  Holland. — 

Reorganization  of  France  by  Henry  IV.  (1598-1610),       .         .  235 


Boofe  jfiftb. 

THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE  UNDER  LOUIS  XIII. 
AND  LOUIS  XIV.  (1610-1715). 

CHAPTER   XVII. 
Louis  XIII.  AND  RICHELIEU — INTERNAL  PACIFICATION  (1610-43). 

The  Minority  of  Louis  XIII.  and  the  Regency  of  Marie  de  Medici 
(1610-17). — Richelieu  humbles  the  Protestants  and  the  High 
Nobility  (1624-42),  ........  255 


CONTENTS.  XV 

CHAPTER   XVIII. 
THE  THIRTY  YEARS'  WAR. 

PAGE 

The  Northern  Countries  and  Germany  at  the  Time  of  the  Thirty 
Years'  War. — The  Thirty  Years'  War  ;  the  Palatine  and  Danish 
Periods  (1618-26) ;  the  Swedish  and  French  Periods  (1630-48),  267 

CHAPTER   XIX. 
ENGLAND  UNDER  THE  STUARTS  AND  CROMWELL. 

The  Stuarts  :  James  I.  (1603-25) ;  Charles  I.  (1625-40). — The  Long 
Parliament  (1640-1649). — The  Commonwealth  of  England 
(1649-60) 286 

CHAPTER   XX. 
FRANCE  FROM  1643  TO  1661. — CONDITION  OF  EUROPE  IN  1661. 

Mazarin  and  the  Fronde. — War  with  Spain  ;  Treaty  of  the  Pyre- 
nees (1659). — Condition  of  Europe  in  1661,  ....  311 

CHAPTER   XXI. 

THE  REIGN  OF  Louis  XIV.  TO  THE  WAR  OF  THE  LEAGUE 
OF  AUGSBURG. 

Administrative  Centralization  of  France;  Colbert  and  Louvois. — War 
in  Flanders  (1667). — First  Coalition  against  France  (1668). — 
War  with  Holland  (1672). — Conquests  by  Louis  XIV.  in  Time 
of  Peace. — Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes  (1685),  .  .  329 

CHAPTER   XXII. 

REVOLUTION  OF  1688  IN  ENGLAND. — SECOND  AND  THIRD 
COALITIONS  AGAINST  FRANCE. — PEACE  OF  RYSWICK 
(1697)  AND  OF  UTRECHT  (1713). 

Charles  II.  and  James  II.  (1660-88). — Wars  of  the  League  of 
Augsburg  (1688-97)  and  of  the  Spanish  Succession  (1701- 
13) 349 

CHAPTER   XXIII. 

LETTERS,  ARTS,  AND  SCIENCES  IN  THE  SEVENTEENTH  CENTURY. 

Letters  and  Arts  in  France. — Letters  and  Arts  in  Foreign  Countries. 

— The  Sciences  in  the  Seventeenth  Century,      ....   365 


XVI  CONTENTS. 

Booft  Sijtb. 

THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.— GREATNESS 

OF  ENGLAND,  RUSSIA,  AND 

PRUSSIA. 

CHAPTER   XXIV. 
RISE  OF  RUSSIA  AND  RUIN  OF  SWEDEN. 

PAGE 

Peter  the  Great  and  Russia  at  the  Beginning  of  the  Eighteenth  Cen- 
tury ;  Power  of  Sweden  ;  Narva  and  Pultowa. — Charles  XII. 
at  Bender;  Treaties  of  the  Pruth  (1711)  and  Nystadt  (1721) 
— Second  Journey  of  Peter  to  Europe  (1716)  ;  St.  Petersburg  ; 
The  Czar  Chief  of  the  Russian  Church,  ....  387 

CHAPTER   XXV. 

CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.— HUMILIATION  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA. 

Regency  of  the  Duke  of  Orleans  ;  Ministries  of  Dubois,  of  the 
Duke  of  Bourbon,  and  of  Fleury  (1715-43). — Formation  of 
Prussia,  and  Situation  of  Austria. — War  of  the  Austrian  Succes- 
sion (1741-48). — The  Seven  Years'  War  (1756-63),  .  .  401 

CHAPTER   XXVI. 

MARITIME  AND  COLONIAL  POWER  OF  ENGLAND. 
England  from  1688  to  1763. — The  English  East  India  Company,     .  434 

CHAPTER  XXVII. 

FOUNDATION  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES  OF  AMERICA. 

Origin  and  Constitution   of   the   English   Colonies   in  America. — 

American  War  (1775-83), 446 

CHAPTER  XXVIII. 

DESTRUCTION  OF  POLAND. — DECLINE  OF  THE  OTTOMANS. — 
GREATNESS  OF  RUSSIA. 

Russia  from  Peter  the  Great  to  Catherine  II. — Catherine  II.  (1762- 
96). — First  Partition  of  Poland  (1772). — Treaties  of  KaTn- 
ardji  (1774)  and  Jassy  (1792). — Second  and  Third  Partitions  of 
Poland  (1793  and  1795), 457 


CONTENTS.  xvii 

36oofe  Seventb. 

PRELIMINARIES  OF  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

CHAPTER   XXIX. 
SCIENCES  AND  LETTERS  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY. 

PAGE 

Scientific  and  Geographical  Discoveries. — Letters  and  Arts,  .  471 

CHAPTER   XXX. 
ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM. 

Disagreement  between  Ideas  and  Institutions. — Agitation  of  Mind 
and  Demands  for  Reforms. — Reforms  Accomplished  by  the 
Governments. — Last  Years  of  Louis  XV.  (1763-74). — Politi- 
cal and  Military  Decline  of  France. — Attempt  at,  and  then 
Abandonment  of  Reforms  under  Louis  XVI.  (1774-93),  .  484 


CHRONOLOGICAL  LIST  of  the  Popes,  Emperors,  and  Princes  who 

reigned  in  the  Principal  States  between  1453  and  1789,      .         .  517 

INDEX, 521 


LIST    OF    MAPS. 

PAGE 

FRANCE    UNDER    LOUIS   XL,   1461-1483           ...  26 

THE    BRITISH    ISLANDS,   1066-1603           ....  38 

ITALY   IN    THE   XV.    CENTURY 74 

EUROPE   IN    1648 284 

EUROPEAN   STATES    IN    1789 482 


HISTORY  OF  MODERN  TIMES. 
(1453-1789.) 


BOOK   I. 

REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER,  OR 
DEFINITIVE  RUIN  OF  THE  POLITICAL  INSTI- 
TUTIONS OF  THE  MIDDLE  AGES,  AND  A 
NEW  SYSTEM  OF  GOVERNMENT. 


CHAPTER   I. 

STATE   OF   EUROPE  AT   THE   MIDDLE   OF   THE 
FIFTEENTH    CENTURY. 


The  Boundary  between  the  Middle   Ages  and  Modern  Times. — Western 
Europe. — Northern,  Eastern,  and  Central  States. 


IT  is  customary  to  take  the  year  1453  as  the  end  of  the 
Middle  Ages  and  the  beginning  of  Modern  Times,  because 
that  date  marks  two  important  events  :  the 
beTween°theary  capture  of  Constantinople  by  the  Ottomans, 
Middle  Ages  and  and  the  close  of  the  Hundred  Years'  War 
ies'  between  France  and  England.  But  it  is  in 
a  higher  sphere  that  we  must  seek  reasons  for  tracing  a 
boundary  between  these  two  periods  of  the  world's  life,  and 
we  should  find  them  in  times  more  recent :  at  the  end  of 
the  fifteenth  century  and  at  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth, 
when  was  being  accomplished  the  revolution  that  changed 
the  interests,  the  ideas,  and  the  creeds  of  Europe. 

In  1494  the  Italian  wars  began,  and  with  them  the  rival- 
ries and  the  battles  of  the  great  European  nations. 


2         RE  VOL  U 7 'ION  IN  THE  POLI1 7CA L  ORDER.     [BOOK  I . 

In  1492  Christopher  Columbus  discovered  America,  and 
five  years  later  Vasco  da  Gama  reached  the  Indies — com- 
mercial revolution. 

In  1508  Raphael  and  Michael  Angelo  were  painting  at 
Rome  the  loggie  of  the  Vatican  and  the  Sixtine  Chapel — 
revolution  in  the  arts. 

At  that  period  Copernicus  was  meditating  his  new  sys- 
tem of  the  world — revolution  in  science — while  printing, 
recently  discovered,  and  classic  antiquity,  as  it  were, 
refound,  were  making  ready  a  literary  revolution. 

Finally,  in  1517,  burst  forth  the  voice  of  Luther — 
religious  revolution. 

Modern  civilization  is  still  under  the  influence  of  these 
grand  events,  but  it  also  remained  three  or  four  hundred 
years  under  that  of  another  event  which  was  brought  about 
before  the  rest,  namely,  the  advent  of  absolute  royalty. 
In  the  second  half  of  the  fifteenth  century  the  kings  of 
France,  England,  Portugal,  and  Spain  added  to  their  power 
rights  which  the  Middle  Ages  had  denied  them,  and  which 
the  Roman  emperors  had  formerly  exercised. 

The  date  1453,  though  not  rigorously  exact,  is  sufficiently 
reasonable  for  us  to  retain  it. 

Of  all  the  dominant  facts  which  determine  the  new 
character  of  modern  history  the  change  in  the  govern- 
ments of  the  peoples  is  the  first  to  manifest  itself  and  to 
produce  its  consequences  ;  it  will  also  be  the  first  which  we 
shall  study,  but  it  is  appropriate  to  enumerate  beforehand 
the  different  states  which  divided  Europe  among  them 

in  1453- 

At  that  period  the  European  peoples  were  not  united  as 
to-day  by  similarity  of  manners,  tastes,  habits,  and  by  the 

thousand  ties   which  frequent   relations  de- 
Europe?       velop.      Hardly  did    the    northern    nations 

know  by  name  those  of  the  south. 

However,  all  those  peoples  were  Christian,  and,  save  in 
the  Greek  Church,  all  recognized  the  spiritual  authority 
of  the  Popes  as  successors  of  St.  Peter  and  vicars  of  Jesus 
Christ.  Apparently,  therefore,  Europe,  which  in  the  eleventh 
century  had  rushed  with  so  much  enthusiasm  to  the  crusade 
when  Constantinople  was  menaced,  ought  in  the  middle  of 
the  fifteenth  to  rise  en  masse  against  Islam,  which  now  estab- 
lished its  fixed  habitation  on  European  soil.  Nothing  of 
this  was  seen,  however  ;  only  by  the  attentive  examination 


CHAP.  I.]     MIDDLE  OF  THE  FIFTEENTH  CENTURY.          3 

of  its  political  situation  shall  we  discover  the  causes  of  its 
inaction  and  indifference. 

France,  by  the  expulsion  of  the  English,  had  just  founded 
her  nationality  in  an  impregnable  manner  ;  her  political 
unity  was  far  from  being  equally  well  constituted.  The 
royal  domain  was  hampered  on  all  sides,  as  was  the  authority 
of  the  king,  by  the  domains  or  the  influence  of  the  feudal 
nobility,  due  in  great  part  to  the  baleful  custom  of  appa- 
nages. But  Charles  VII.,  who  had  won  the  title  of  the 
Victorious,  was  about  to  merit  that  of  the  Well  Served,  thanks 
to  the  able  ministers  who  surrounded  him,  and  who,  after 
having  reconquered  the  kingdom,  wished  to  reorganize  it. 

England  under  an  imbecile  sovereign,  the  unhappy  Henry 
VI.,  and  a  foreign  queen,  Margaret  of  Anjou,  saw  those 
catastrophes  already  being  accomplished  which  foretold 
the  terrible  tragedies  of  the  War  of  the  Roses.  The  most 
popular  prince,  the  Duke  of  Gloucester,  had  just  perished 
in  a  mysterious  manner  and  without  doubt  by  order  of  the 
court  (1447). 

Scotland  was  the  theater  of  a  desperate  struggle  between 
the  kings  and  their  barons.  James  I.  had  been  assassinated 
in  1437  by  the  grandees.  To  break  their  league  James  II. 
in  his  turn  poignarded  with  his  own  hand  their  chief, 
William  Douglas,  but  he  died  in  1460  leaving  as  his  heir 
a  child  seven  years  of  age,  James  III.,  who  was  slain  in  cold 
blood  after  the  battle  of  Sauchieburn  (1488). 

Spain  still  consisted  of  five  kingdoms.  In  Castile  that 
very  year  (1453)  the  grandees  had  beheaded  the  favorite 
of  John  II.;  and  this  tragedy  shows  that  there  existed 
neither  a  strong  royalty  nor  a  very  tranquil  country.  So 
the  crusade  against  the  Moors  had  been  abandoned,  and 
the  Mussulman  king  of  Granada  presumed  to  interfere 
in  the  troubles  of  the  kingdom.  But  on  every  side  Castile 
enveloped  this  last  vestige  of  Arab  domination,  and  was  to 
overthrow  it  as  soon  as  it  regained  union, and  internal  peace. 

In  Navarre  the  father  was  fighting  against  the  son. 

When  Castile  took  possession  of  the  kingdom  of  Murcia, 
Aragon  was  no  longer  in  contact  with  the  Moors,  so  its 
kings  had  turned  their  ambition  toward  the  Mediterranean 
and  Italy.  But  Alphonso  V.  the  Magnanimous  was  him- 
self about  to  ruin  the  greatness  of  his  house  by  dividing  at 
his  death  Aragon,  Sardinia,  Sicily,  and  Naples  between  his 
brother  and  his  son  (1458). 


4      REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

Portugal,  also  separated  from  the  Moors  of  Spain,  after 
Cordova  and  Seville  had  been  captured  by  the  Castilians, 
and  no  longer  able  to  aggrandize  itself  in  the  peninsula, 
was  entirely  given  up  to  discoveries  along  the  African 
shores.  In  this  path  it  was  going  to  find  a  century  of  pros- 
perity and  power. 

Italy  had  freed  itself  almost  completely  from  German 
supremacy  ;  but  she  had  not  been  able  to  constitute  her 
national  unity,  and  found  herself  divided  into  a  crowd  of 
states.  Alphonso  V.  of  Aragon  reigned  at  Naples  from 
1442,  and  endeavored  to  extend  his  influence  in  upper  Italy, 
where  he  would  gladly  have  destroyed  the  fortunes  of  Sforza. 
In  perpetual  revolutions  Genoa  forgot  both  Galata,  that 
suburb  of  Constantinople  which  the  Ottomans  had  just 
captured  from  her,  and  the  dangers  which  menaced  her 
commerce  in  the  Levant.  Embarrassed  by  her  liberty,  she 
yielded  alternately  to  Milan  and  France.  In  1453  for 
exception  she  belonged  to  nobody.  Venice  had  given  her- 
self up  to  ambition  for  continental  conquests,  and  had 
created  herself  enemies  in  Italy  even,  when  she  ought  to 
have  employed  all  her  resources  to  defend  her  colonies 
and  her  factories  against  the  Ottomans.  A  condottiere, 
Francesco  Sforza,  had  just  deprived  the  Visconti  of  Milan, 
which  he  kept  despite  the  emperor  and  the  King  of 
Naples  (1447). 

Peace  had  just  been  re-established  in  the  Church  by  the 
abdication  of  Felix  V.  and  the  declaration  of  obedience 
made  by  the  fathers  of  the  Council  of  Basel  to  the  new 
Pope,  Nicolas  V.  (1449).  This  lettered  pontiff  welcomed 
the  learned  fugitives  of  Constantinople  ;  but  the  papacy, 
barely  escaped  from  the  schism,  had  not  as  in  the  past  a 
voice  sufficiently  powerful  to  rouse  Christendom  against  the 
infidels  ;  returning  to  Rome  after  so  long  an  exile,  it  found 
the  pontifical  states  a  prey  to  the  most  frightful  disorder. 
In  Tuscany,  Cosmo,  son  of  the  banker  Giovanni  de  Medici, 
lulled  the  Florentines  to  sleep  by  the  charm  of  the  arts  and 
poetry.  Florence  played  in  Italy  only  a  secondary  part, 
and  even  shared  Tuscany  with  many  republics  and  seign- 
iories. Twenty  other  princes  bore  sway  in  the  Romagna 
and  in  Lombardy  ;  and  a  brilliant  but  corrupt  civilization 
covered  all  Italy. 

The  eight  Helvetic  cantons  had  just  concluded  an  alli- 
ance with  France  (1452).  The  victories  over  Austria  at 


CHAP.  I.]     MIDDLE  OF  THE  FIFTEENTH  CENTUR  Y.          5 

Morgarten  and  Sempach,  the  recent  but  glorious  defeat  of 
St.  Jacques,  had  carried  afar  the  military  renown  of  these 
mountaineers. 

In  the  north  the  union  formed  at  Calmar  in  1397  between 

Sweden  and  Denmark  had  just  been  broken.     The  Swedes 

had   elected  a  prince  of  their  blood.  Charles 

Notnern,  east-  .  ' 

em,  and  central  VIII.,  Canutson  (1448)  :  this  election  was  to 
become  for  the  two  peoples  the  origin  of  a 
hundred  years'  war.  The  preponderance  on  this  side  be- 
longed to  Denmark. 

Russia,  interested  more  directly  than  any  other  nation 
in  the  woes  of  the  Byzantine  Greeks,  was  unable  to  act  ; 
the  Tartars  of  the  Golden  Horde  held  her  under  their  yoke  ; 
the  republic  of  Novgorod  isolated  her  from  the  Baltic  ; 
Europe  was  closed  to  her  by  Poland.  The  Grand  Duke  of 
Moscow,  Basil  III.,  in  1445  had  been  made  prisoner  by  the 
Khan  of  Kazan  and  compelled  to  pay  ransom.  A  usurper, 
Demetrius,  had  profited  by  this  disaster  to  overthrow  the 
grand  duke  and  put  out  his  eyes.  Basil  was  restored,  but 
in  1451  the  Tartars  penetrated  as  far  as  the  walls  of  Mos- 
cow, whence  they  were  repulsed  by  cannon.  Thus  far 
nothing  announced  the  greatness  reserved  to  this  empire. 

But  already  the  Golden  Horde  was  becoming  dismem- 
bered and  therefore  weakened.  The  petty  principalities 
and  republics  were  to  promptly  disappear  as  soon  as  the 
grand  duke  had  nothing  more  to  fear  from  the  Mongols  : 
this  soon  took  place  under  Ivan  III.  (1462-1504),  that  coarse 
outline  of  another  barbarian  of  genius  who  will  be  called 
Peter  the  Great.  Ivan  is  already  about  to  take  the  title  of 
brother  of  Qesar  Augustus,  to  espouse  a  daughter  of  the 
Paleologi,  as  if  he  wished  to  proclaim  himself  heir  of  the 
emperors  of  Constantinople,  and  allow  himself  to  be  called 
"  the  star  chosen  of  God  to  give  light  to  the  world." 

In  Prussia  and  Livonia  the  Teutonic  order,  conquered 
by  the  Poles,  who  in  1435  ^ac^  stripped  it  of  Pomerelia 
(Dantzic),  was  still  enfeebled  by  the  insurrection  of  the 
cities  and  country  nobles  who  in  1440  had  formed  the 
League  of  Marienwerder.  This  league,  in  spite  of  a 
papal  excommunication  and  an  imperial  command,  refused 
obedience  to  the  order,  which,  after  having  ruled  in  all  the 
north  of  Europe,  was  now  in  full  decline. 

To  Poland,  Casimir  IV.  in  1444  had  reunited  Lithuania. 
This  reunion,  precarious  though  it  still  was,  bestowed 


6       REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

sufficient  strength  upon  Poland  to  enable  her  to  hold  the 
foremost  place  among  Slavic  states. 

At  the  center  of  the  continent  Germany,  so  strong  by  the 
number  and  the  warlike  spirit  of  its  inhabitants,  was  con- 
demned to  powerlessness  by  the  vices  of  its  constitution. 
The  feudal  aristocracy  had  almost  completely  annulled  the 
central  power,  and  the  Holy  German  Empire  was  only  an 
agglomeration  in  anarchy  of  independent  states,  adjacent 
but  not  united,  whose  chief,  without  power,  without  arms, 
without  revenue,  possessed  only  the  name  of  emperor  ;  so 
with  difficulty  did  the  electors  find  a  man  willing  to  accept 
the  onerous  title.  One  member  of  the  house  of  Hapsburg- 
Austria,  Frederick  of  Styria,  elected  in  1440  after  the  refusal 
of  the  Landgrave  of  Hesse,  delayed  three  months  to  com- 
municate his  acceptance,  and  reigned  as  Duke  of  Austria 
rather  than  as  emperor.  However,  from  Carniola  and  Car- 
inthia  he  could  hear  the  threatening  sound  of  Ottoman 
progress  in  the  valley  of  the  Danube.  But  instead  of  unit- 
ing energetically  with  John  Huniadi,  the  heroic  defender  of 
Hungary,  he  retained  the  young  king  of  that  country,  Ladis- 
laus  VI.,  and  only  gave  him  up  on  compulsion  in  1453. 

Master  of  Austria,  Hungary,  and  Bohemia,  Ladislaus  VI., 
son  of  the  last  Emperor  of  Germany,  could  have  founded 
a  power  which  would  have  become  the  bulwark  of  Europe 
against  the  Ottomans ;  but  Bohemia  had  not  yet  recovered 
from  the  horrid  Hussite  war.  The  utraquists  there  formed 
a  powerful  party  who  had  imposed  on  the  prince  terms  at 
which  he  was  indignant ;  and  in  Hungary  this  Austrian 
king  in  the  midst  of  the  Magyar  nobility  seemed  like  a 
foreign  prince.  Moreover,  he  was  himself  incompetent  for 
the  task  he  should  have  fulfilled. 

The  Ottomans  had  been  arrested  in  the  valley  of  the 
Danube  by  six  Christian  states,  three  south  of  that  river — 
the  kingdoms  of  Bulgaria,  Servia,  and  Bosnia,  and  three  to 
the  north — the  principalities  of  Moldavia  and  Walachiaand 
the  kingdom  of  Hungary.  But  in  1453  Bulgaria  had  been 
conquered  more  than  half  a  century  before,  Servia  was  in 
great  part  subdued,  and  the  Krai  had  been  able  to  save 
Belgrade,  the  key  of  the  valley  of  the  Danube,  only  by 
remitting  it  to  the  Hungarians  (1437)  ;  Bosnia  was  already 
tributary  to  Mohammed  II.,  and  the  sultans  had  long  in- 
scribed Walachia  on  the  lengthy  roll  of  their  provinces.  Up 
to  that  time  the  Moldavians  had  escaped  the  yoke,  and  the 


CHAP.  I.]     MIDDLE  OF  THE  FIFTEENTH  CENTURY.       7 

Hungarians  were  making  head  against  the  storm  under 
their  brave  chief  John  Huniadi,  to  whom  his  still  more  fa- 
mous son  Mathias  Corvinus  was  to  succeed.  Hungary  in 
the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries  against  the  Ottomans 
will  be  what  Poland  had  been  in  the  thirteenth  and  four- 
teenth, the  bulwark  of  Christianity. 

The  Ottomans  were  then  led  by  one  of  their  most  glorious 
sultans,  Mohammed  II.,  who  had  sworn  to  capture  Constan- 
tinople, and  who  on  May  29,  1453,  kept  his  oath  :  Chris- 
tianity had  allowed  its  last  rampart  to  fall. 

At  the  sound  of  this  overwhelming  disaster  terror  spread 
in  Italy.  All  the  princes  of  the  peninsula  felt  themselves 
menaced  and  were  solemnly  reconciled  to  each  other  at 
Lodi  (May  9,  1454).  They  took  up  again  the  thought  of 
the  crusades  ;  this  thought  crossed  the  mountains,  and  at 
the  court  of  the  Grand  Duke  of  the  West  all  the  Flemish 
and  Burgundian  nobility  swore  upon  the  pheasant*  to  take 
arms  in  order  to  hurl  the  Ottomans  back  into  Asia.  Empty 
words.  The  time  of  the  crusades  was  past,  no  more  to 
return.  Venice  treated  that  very  year  with  Mohammed  II., 
who  now  ruled  from  the  middle  of  Asia  Minor  to  the  walls 
of  Belgrade  and  the  shores  of  the  Adriatic. 

In  fact  Europe  was  no  longer  capable  of  uniting,  as  at 
the  eleventh  century,  in  one  great  religious  thought,  nor  was 
she  yet  in  condition  to  act  in  concert  for  a  grand  political 
idea.  At  the  middle  of  the  fifteenth  century  everyone 
lived  apart  in  isolation  as  during  the  full  Middle  Ages  : 
there  was  not  a  single  general  question  which  could  rally 
all  the  governments  ;  there  was  not  even  any  great  force  to 
rally  the  peoples  about  a  principle.  However,  this  force 
existed,  and  in  France,  always  the  vanguard  of  Europe,  it 
was  already  acting.  It  was  royalty  which  was  to  draw  each 
state  from  feudal  chaos,  to  secure  internal  order,  to  prepare 
equality,  and  through  the  encouragement  given  to  com- 
merce, manufactures,  letters,  and  arts  to  aid  in  the  develop- 
ment of  a  new  civilization. 

*  The  pheasant  was  served  with  great  ceremony  at  mediaeval  festivities, 
and  in  the  name  of  this  noble  bird  oaths  were  taken  to  join  a  crusade  01 
to  perform  any  special  feat  of  chivalry. — ED. 


CHAPTER   II. 
FRANCE   FROM    1453   TO    1494. 


Progress  of  the  Royal  Authority  during  the  Last  Years  of  Charles  VII. 
— Louis  XL  (1461-83). — League  of  Public  Welfare  (1465). — Inter- 
view of  Peronne  (1468). — Ambition  and  Death  of  the  Duke  of  Bur- 
gundy (1477). — Ruin  of  the  Great  Feudal  Houses. — Death  of  Louis 
XL  (1483).— Reign  of  Charles  VIII.  until  the  Italian  Expedition 
(1483-94). 


THE  French  royalty  had  already  passed  through  many 
vicissitudes.  Clovis  and  his  sons  were  only  warlike  chiefs  ; 

progressofthe  HuSh  CaPet  was  a  feudal  lord,  having  one 
royal  authority  title  more  than  his  vassals,  but  no  more  power, 
year^ofchades  Under  his  earlier  successors  even  this  shadow 
vn.  of  authority  was  lost.  With  Louis  the  Fat 

or  the  Vigilant  royalty  shook  off  this  torpor,  and  the  king 
became  the  chief  policeman  of  the  country.  By  intro- 
ducing security  upon  the  highways  and,  above  all,  better 
order  in  society  he  gained  a  popularity  which  doubled 
his  strength.  Philip  Augustus  rendered  the  royalty  con- 
quering, Louis  IX.  consecrated  it;  under  Philip  the  Fair 
and  Philip  of  Valois  it  became  sufficiently  strong  to  destroy 
a  powerful  feudalism,  to  make  itself  master  of  the  adminis- 
tration of  the  country,  to  brave  the  successor  of  Gregory 
VII.,  and  to  progress  toward  absolute  power.  But  then 
the  Hundred  Years'  War  began  ;  France  was  thrown  back 
into  chaos,  a  new  feudalism  was  formed  which  was  even 
aided  by  the  enfeebled  hands  of  the  royalty  :  at  the  begin- 
ning of  his  reign  Charles  VII.  was  nothing  but  the  King  of 
Bourges. 

But  under  the  pressure  of  their  misfortunes  the  French 
drew  nearer  each  other.  At  the  touch  of  the  foreigner  the 
nation  recognized  itself,  became  conscious  of  its  existence, 
and  was  saved  by  that  outburst  of  patriotism  which  was 
personified  in  Joan  of  Arc.  Once  delivered  from  the 
abyss,  it  wished  to  fall  back  into  it  no  more,  rallied  around 


FRANCE  FROM  1453    TO   1494.  9 

its  chief,  and  bestowed  upon  him  strength  in  return  for  the 
order  and  security  which  he  assured  it.  The  indolent 
Charles  VII.  found  himself  thus  restored  to  the  power 
which  Philip  the  Fair  possessed,  and  the  King  of  Bourges 
became  Charles  the  Victorious.  Skillful  generals — Riche- 
mond,  Dunois,  La  Hire,  Xaintrailles — led  his  armies  ;  wise 
ministers — Jacques  Coeur,  the  Bureau  brothers,  Chevalier, 
Cousinot — directed  his  councils  ;  reforms  were  accom- 
plished, victories  gained,  and  France  was  delivered  from 
the  English. 

Of  these  reforms  the  most  important  was  that  of  the 
army.  In  the  Middle  Ages  all  the  military  strength  was 
in  the  hands  of  the  grandees  ;  the  king,  to  take  it  from 
them  and  control  it,  instituted  fifteen  military  companies, 
which  were  the  beginning  of  the  standing  army  ;  to  pay 
them  he  introduced  an  annual  impost.  At  the  same  time 
the  artillery  was  put  upon  a  formidable  footing.  Here- 
after no  good  armor  could  make  the  noble  invulnerable  ; 
there  was  no  wall  that  could  not  be  thrown  down.  The 
bullet  traversed  all,  and  the  highest  towers  were  the  soonest 
overthrown.  But  this  formidable  weapon  was  very  costly  : 
few  save  the  king  could  have  cannon.  Shortly  he  alone 
was  to  have  them.  Then  he  would  possess  the  two 
mightiest  material  forces  which  exist,  money  and  an  army  ; 
and  in  public  opinion  he  would  have  still  a  third  title, 
worth  more  than  both  the  others.  So  no  feudal  ambition 
could  arise  without  being  humiliated,  no  revolt  burst  forth 
without  being  speedily  punished. 

The  nobles  made  the  proof  of  all  this  tinder  Charles 
himself.  The  plots  which  they  formed  were  impotent,  and 
they  passed  through  a  new  experience,  beholding  the  law 
operative  in  their  ranks.  A  leader  in  extortions,  the  bastard 
brother  of  the  Duke  of  Bourbon,  was  sewed  up  in  a  sack 
and  cast  into  a  river  ;  the  Lord  of  Esparre,  who  intrigued 
for  the  English,  was  beheaded  ;  the  Duke  of  Alencon,  who 
promised  to  open  his  fortress  to  them,  was  condemned  to 
death;  and  the  Duke  of  Armagnac  was  banished  and  suf- 
fered confiscation  of  his  goods.  The  dauphin  himself,  who 
began  all  the  plots  against  his  father,  was  first  reduced  to 
living  in  his  appanage,  and  then  obliged  to  flee  to  the  Duke 
of  Burgundy. 

However,  the  nobility  did  not  accept  its  defeat.  Under 
Louis  XI.  it  was  seen  joining  in  a  final  battle,  for  its 


10      REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER,     f BOOK  I. 

dominions  and  resources  were  sufficiently  vast  to  give  it  a 
legitimate  hope  of  yet  being  the  victor. 

The  force  that  pressed  forward  the  French  royalty  and 
which  was  going  to  likewise  press  forward  all  European 
royalties — I  mean  the  need  of  concentration  of  power — 
acted  also  in  the  interior  of  the  great  fiefs.  The  Duke  of 
Brittany,  for  example,  in  his  western  peninsula,  so  adapted 
to  form  a  state  apart,  and  the  Duke  of  Burgundy  in  his 
vast  and  opulent  provinces  of  the  north  and  east, 
dreamed  of  and  attained  sovereign  authority  just  like  the 
king,  whereby  an  additional  means  was  placed  in  their 
hands  to  make  royalty  recoil.  The  Count  of  Dunois  at  the 
moment  when  Charles  VII.  was  expiring  had  expressed 
the  sentiment  of  all  :  "  Gentlemen,  let  each  one  look  out 
for  himself." 

The  new  king  had  been  during  the  preceding  reign  the 

leader  of  the  malcontents.     In  1440  he  was  the  animating 

spirit  of  a  plot  against  his  father.     Later  his 

Lou»XI.(i46i-  y.  .         .  , 

63).  League  of  restless  spirit  and  secret  intrigues  had  caused 
0465)°  Winter-  ^'s  exi'e  to  his  appanage.  Thence  he  had  so 
viewofPeronne  continued  his  underhand  dealings  that 
Charles  VII.  had  sent  Dammartin  with  an 
army  to  arrest  him.  He  had  escaped,  had  sought  an  asylum 
from  the  Duke  of  Burgundy,  and  was  still  in  the  states  of 
that  prince  when  he  learned  of  his  father's  death.  Charles 
VII.,  undermined  by  sickness  and  fearing  a  worse  disease 
— an  experience  which  happened  sometimes,  they  say,  to  the 
enemies  of  his  son — let  himself  die  of  hunger,  July  22, 
1461. 

The  grandees  believed  their  reign  had  come  when  they 
saw  the  former  chief  of  the  Praguerie,*  the  prote'gt  of  the 
Duke  of  Burgundy,  almost  receive  from  the  latter's  hand 
the  crown  of  France.  He  quickly  undeceived  them.  He 
removed  the  majority  of  the  officers  appointed  by  his  father 
and  reinstated  those  whom  he  had  condemned,  as  Alencon 
and  Armagnac.  The  people  expected  a  general  abolition 
of  taxes  as  sign  of  joyous  advent :  the  permanent  tax  was 
raised  from  1,800,000  livres  to  3,000,000 ;  and  when  riots 
broke  out  at  Rheims  and  Rouen  he  repressed  them  sternly. 

*  The  Praguerie  was  an  insurrection  against  the  king  which  distracted 
France  in  1440,  and  which  was  principally  the  work  of  the  dauphin  Louis. 
It  derived  its  name  from  the  Bohemian  capital  Prague,  which  at  the  same 
time  was  suffering  from  the  atrocities  of  the  Hussite  War. — ED. 


CHAP.  II.]  FRANCE  FROM  1453    TO  1494.  II 

He  intimated  to  the  University  of  Paris  the  papal  prohibition 
of  interfering  with  the  affairs  of  the  king  and  the  city.  He 
curtailed  the  extraordinarily  extended  jurisdiction  of  the 
parliaments  of  Paris  and  Toulouse  by  creating  at  their 
expense  in  1462  the  parliament  of  Bordeaux.  He  had 
already  organized  in  1453  that  of  Grenoble,  and  later,  in  1479, 
he  founded  that  of  Dijon. 

The  ecclesiastical  body  had  not  greater  reason  for  satis- 
faction. The  king,  less  for  the  sake  of  pleasing  Rome  than 
for  displeasing  his  nobility,  revoked  the  Pragmatic  Sanction 
of  Bourges,  despite  the  remonstrances  of  Parliament,  which 
represented  to  him  that  through  annates,  anticipatory  dona- 
tions, and  the  like,  the  Holy  See  derived  each  year  from 
France  1,200,000  ducats  ;  but  he  demanded  of  the  clergy  an 
exact  cadaster  of  their  property  with  documents  in  confirma- 
tion, a  demand  which  in  every  respect  was  menacing  for  the 
proprietors.  Finally  the  nobility  with  fright  and  anger 
heard  him  forbid  the  chase,  lay  claim  to  all  the  ancient 
feudal  rights,  taxes  on  wines  and  liquors,  the  redemptions, 
wardships,  and  forfeitures,  and  draw  up  enormous  lists  of 
taxes  in  arrears  and  demand  their  immediate  payment. 

He  did  not  even  treat  the  high  aristocracy  more  gently. 
He  deprived  the  house  of  Breze"  of  the  seneschalship  of 
Normandy  ;  the  house  of  Bourbon  of  the  government  of 
Guyenne,  which  he  gave  to  a  member  of  the  house  of  Anjou 
in  order  to  set  the  two  families  at  variance  ;  and  he  took 
away  from  his  brother  Charles  his  government  of  Berry. 
He  obliged  the  Duke  of  Brittany  to  recognize  appeals  from 
his  court  to  the  parliament  of  Paris,  to  pay  the  dues  of 
feudal  vassalage,  and  to  accept  the  bishops  whom  he  sent 
him.  He  arraigned  even  the  powerful  house  of  Burgundy, 
ransomed  from  the  aged  Duke  Philip  the  Good  the  cities  of 
the  Somme,  which  the  Count  of  Charolais,  his  son,  would  not 
have  been  willing  to  restore  at  any  price  (1463) ;  so,  too,  he 
caused  the  surrender  to  himself  by  the  King  of  Aragon  of 
Cerdagne  and  Roussillon  as  guarantee  of  350,000  gold 
crowns  which  he  lent  him  (1462). 

Louis  had  not  reigned  four  years  when  everybody  was 
against  him.  Five  hundred  princes  or  lords  formed  the 
League  of  Public  Welfare,  inasmuch  as  they  acted,  so 
they  said,  only  through  compassion  for  the  miseries  of 
the  kingdom  occasioned  by  "  the  pitiable  government  of 
Louis  XI." 


12     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.      [BOOK  I. 

Louis  judged  that  so  many  princes  and  lords  would  not 
speedily  set  themselves  in  motion,  and  that  it  would  be  pos- 
sible for  him  to  win  the  game  by  activity  and  promptitude. 
He  hastened  first  against  the  confederates  of  the  south  and 
against  their  chief,  the  Duke  of  Bourbon.  With  that  dis- 
ciplined army  and  that  excellent  artillery  which  his  father 
had  bequeathed  him,  he  in  fact  imposed  upon  the  duke  new 
oaths  of  fidelity. 

But  while  he  thought  he  had  finished  with  them,  the 
Count  of  Maine,  charged  with  arresting  the  Bretons,  re- 
treated before  them  ;  the  Duke  of  Nevers,  instead  of  defend- 
ing the  barrier  of  the  Somme  against  the  Burgundians, 
delivered  it  to  the  Count  of  Charolais  ;  and  July  5  this  count, 
who  was  already  called  Charles  the  Bold,  arrived  before 
Paris  without  having  encountered  a  single  obstacle.  Every- 
where he  made  proclamation  that  he  came  for  the  good  of 
the  country,  that  he  abolished  the  villain  tax  and  the  salt 
tax. 

Would  Paris  declare  for  the  princes  or  for  the  king  ? 
This  was  a  question  of  life  and  death  to  Louis  XL,  who, 
paying  no  more  attention  to  the  followers  of  Bourbon  and 
to  the  conspirators  of  the  south,  thought  only  of  re-entering 
his  capital,  believing  himself  lost  if  he  did  not  re-enter  it. 
He  arrived  at  Monthery  in  the  morning  of  July  16,  and  there 
found  the  Burgundians,  who  blocked  his  way.  Forced  to 
fight,  the  king  made  a  vigorous  attack.  He  charged  and 
dismounted  the  Count  of  St.  Pol,  who  was  in  front.  The 
Bold  with  the  bulk  of  his  army  in  his  turn  charged  one 
wing  of  the  king's  forces,  put  it  to  rout,  and  pursued  it  to 
within  a  half  league  of  Monthery.  Thus  each  party  was 
half  victorious,  half  defeated  ;  but  the  end  of  Louis  was 
attained  :  he  had  entered  Paris.  There  he  was  shut  in  by 
50,000  men.  Before  this  army  had  closed  all  the  issues  the 
king  departed  August  10  for  Normandy,  and  returned 
August  28  with  12,000  men,  60  wagons  of  powder,  700 
muids  of  flour,*  and  provisions  of  all  sorts.  Then  he  went  to 
take  the  oriflamb  from  St.  Denis  and  pretended  that  he 
wished  to  attack  while  in  reality  desirous  only  to  keep  on 
the  defensive. 

Although  Louis  XI.  was  personally  very  brave  on  the  field 

*  The  muid  (Latin  modius)  was  a  measure  introduced  by  Charlemagne 
of  very  varying  quantity,  but  in  1465  equivalent  to  41^  bushels. — ED. 


CHAP.  II.]  FRANCE  FROM  1453    TO   1494.  13 

of  battle  his  favorite  combats  were  those  of  the  mind,  of 
finesse  and  ruse.  Humble  in  speech  and  attire,  giving 
much,  but  promising  far  more,  buying  or  buying  back 
without  bargaining  those  whom  he  needed,  and  holding  none 
in  resentment  for  the  past,  he  was  sure  of  attaching  to  him- 
self  many  of  those  princes  and  lords  who  had  so  much  dif- 
ficulty in  living  together.  So  he  negotiated  and  parleyed 
incessantly.  Many  of  the  conspirators  had  already  offered 
to  sell  their  allegiance  :  the  Count  of  Armagnac  for  money, 
the  Duke  of  Nemours  for  lands,  the  Count  of  St.  Pol  for  the 
sword  of  Constable  of  France,  others  for  pensions  or  com- 
mands. Nothing  was  refused.  By  his  diplomacy  the  king 
saw  the  league  already  dissolved,  and  the  dukes  of  Brit- 
tany and  Burgundy  isolated  and  perhaps  enemies. 

Unhappily  Louis  XI.  could  not  be  everywhere  at  once. 
He  was  powerless  against  desertions  and  distant  treasons, 
of  which  many  were  taking  place.  Pontoise  was  delivered 
up  by  its  governor,  Rouen  likewise  ;  then  Evreux,  Caen, 
Beauvais,  Peronne,  declared  for  the  princes.  The  king 
hastened  to  finish.  He  granted  everything  they  wanted  : 
to  his  brother  the  Duke  of  Berry,  Normandy  ;  to  the  Duke 
of  Burgundy,  Bologne,  Guines,  Roye,  Montdidier,  Peronne, 
cities  of  the  Somme  ;  to  the  Count  of  Charolais,  Ponthieu  ; 
to  the  Duke  of  Brittany,  exemption  from  appeals  to  Parlia- 
ment, direct  nomination  of  bishops,  and  exemption  from 
feudal  dues — in  a  word  a  petty  independent  royalty  ;  to  the 
Duke  of  Lorraine,  the  march  of  Champagne  without  obliga- 
tion of  homage,  Mouzon,  St.  Menehould,  Neufchateau, 
30,000  crowns  in  ready  money  ;  to  the  dukes  of  Bourbon 
and  Nemours,  to  the  counts  of  Armagnac,  of  Dunois,  of 
Dammartin,  to  the  Sire  d'Albret  and  to  very  many  more, 
lands  and  enormous  pensions,  without  counting  promises 
for  the  future.  As  to  the  public  welfare,  nobody  spoke  of 
it ;  no  one  had  seriously  thought  about  it. 

Such  a  treaty  strictly  executed  would  have  been  the  ruin 
of  the  royalty  and  of  France.  But  one  could  be  sure  that 
Louis  XI.  would  not  execute  it  if  there  were  possibility  of 
doing  otherwise  ;  already  Parliament,  supple  to  his  hand, 
refused  its  registration. 

The  cession  of  Normandy  was  especially  dangerous,  inas- 
much as  by  means  of  this  province  the  dominions  of  the 
dukes  of  Brittany  and  Burgundy  touched  each  other,  and 
all  the  coasts  from  Nantes  to  Dunkirk  were  open  to  the 


14    REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.      [BOOK  I. 

English.  From  the  first  day  Louis  pondered  the  means  of 
retaking  it.  To  accomplish  this  it  was  necessary  that  the 
Bold,  who  became  duke  in  1467,  but  who  reigned  in  fact 
from  1465,  should  be  diverted  from  the  affairs  of  France. 
Louis  easily  found  means  to  occupy  him  at  home :  three 
insurrections  burst  out  at  once,  at  Liege,  Dinant,  and  Ghent. 
While  the  Bold  hastened  thither  the  king  sent  120,000  gold 
crowns  to  the  Duke  of  Brittany,  which  decided  him  to  keep 
quiet,  and  he  himself  entered  Normandy.  Evreux,  Vernon, 
Louviers,  Rouen,  opened  their  gates.  In  a  few  weeks  the 
entire  province  was  in  his  hands,  and  Charolais  could  do  noth- 
ing more  than  write  to  the  king  very  humbly  in  favor  of  his 
former  ally.  Neither  were  the  chiefs  of  the  other  houses 
more  aggressive.  One  after  the  other  they  had  been  gained 
or  made  neutral  by  the  king.  He  had  attached  to  himself 
the  house  of  Bourbon  by  giving  to  Duke  John  a  whole 
kingdom  to  govern  in  the  south  of  France  (Berry,  Orleans, 
Limousin,  Perigord,  Quercy,  Rouergue,  Languedoc) ;  to 
the  brother  of  the  duke,  Pierre  de  Beaujeu,  his  daughter 
Anne  in  marriage  ;  to  the  bastard  of  Bourbon,  the  title  of 
Admiral  of  France,  and  the  command  of  Honfleur.  He  had 
gained  the  house  of  Anjou  by  giving  120,000  livres  to  John 
of  Calabria,  the  son  of  Rene  ;  the  house  of  Orleans,  by 
attaching  to  himself  the  aged  Dunois,  the  hero  of  the  Eng- 
lish wars  ;  and  finally  the  Count  of  St.  Pol,  the  companion 
and  the  friend  from  childhood  of  the  Bold,  by  making  him 
constable. 

Nobody,  therefore,  thought  of  disputing  Normandy  with 
the  king.  The  Bold  was  solitary,  and  however  great  his 
power,  could  do  nothing,  being  alone.  But  he  formed  an 
alliance  with  Edward  IV.,  the  King  of  England,  and  suc- 
ceeded in  bringing  to  him  the  Duke  of  Brittany,  who  also 
called  the  English  to  his  aid,  and  offered  them  as  guarantee 
of  his  fidelity  twelve  strongholds  in  his  duchy,  whichever 
they  wished. 

In  face  of  this  new  peril  Louis  appealed  to  the  opinion  of 
France.  April  6,  1468,  he  convoked  at  Tours  the  States 
General  of  the  kingdom  and  simply  asked  them  if  they 
were  willing  that  Normandy  should  cease  to  continue  a  part 
of  the  crown  domains.  The  States  replied  "  that  according 
to  the  laws  the  brother  of  the  king  should  have  been  con- 
tent with  an  appanage  of  12,000  livres  income,  and  that 
since  the  king  was  generous  enough  to  give  him  60,000  he 


CHAP.  II.]  FRANCE  FROM  1453    TO  1494.  *5 

ought  to  be  grateful  for  it."  Louis  solemnly  sent  this 
decision  to  the  Duke  of  Burgundy,  who  received  the  deputies 
in  a  harsh  manner.  Meanwhile  he  crushed  the  Duke  of 
Brittany,  and  by  the  rapidity  of  his  blows  forced  him  to 
treat  in  Ancenis  before  the  Duke  of  Burgundy,  who  was 
collecting  his  troops  at  Peronne,  was  able  to  aid  him. 

Then  the  king,  disembarrassed  of  the  Bretons,  and  hav- 
ing at  his  orders  an  excellent  army  and  superior  artillery, 
could  apparently  have  treated  the  Duke  of  Burgundy  with 
little  mercy  ;  but  at  Portsmouth  there  was  an  English  fleet 
and  army  ready  to  cross.  King  Edward  had  publicly 
announced  to  his  Parliament  his  approaching  descent  into 
France  ;  this,  above  all,  Louis  XI.  desired  to  prevent. 

The  best  means  of  preventing  it  was  by  treating  also 
with  the  Bold.  Counting  upon  his  adroitness,  Louis  wished 
to  conduct  the  negotiations  himself,  and  went  to  find  the 
duke  at  Peronne.  This  was  a  great  imprudence  despite 
the  safe  conduct  which  he  had  obtained  before  putting 
himself  in  the  hands  of  his  enemy,  for  the  princes  of  that 
age  were  not  greatly  in  the  habit  of  keeping  their  word, 
and  he  least  of  all. 

For  a  long  time  Louis  had  emissaries  at  Liege,  a  turbu- 
lent city  situated  outside  the  states  of  Burgundy,  and 
depending  only  on  its  bishop  ;  but  this  bishop,  Louis  of 
Bourbon,  having  placed  himself  under  the  protection  of  the 
duke,  every  revolt  against  him  seemed  a  revolt  against  the 
duke  himself.  Now  at  the  time  while  Louis  was  proceed- 
ing toward  Peronne  an  insurrection  broke  out  at  Liege, 
and  he  was  already  conferring  with  the  Bold  when  the 
news  arrived  that  the  citizens  of  Liege  had  put  their  bishop 
in  prison  and  had  massacred  many  canons.  Charles 
became  infuriated  in  consequence,  accused  the  king  of 
treason,  and  shut  him  up  in  the  castle  of  Peronne,  where 
Charles  the  Simple  had  already  died  in  captivity.  Louis 
did  not  go  free  till  after  having  signed  a  ruinous  and 
humiliating  treaty.  He  promised  to  yield  Champagne  to 
his  brother,  which  brought  the  Burgundians  without  strik- 
ing a  blow  to  the  gates  of  Paris,  and  agreed  to  accompany 
the  duke  against  Liege.  That  unhappy  city,  whose  inhab- 
itants were  fighting  with  "  Long  live  the  king  "  upon  their 
lips,  was  sacked  (1468). 

For  Louis  XI.  and  for  Charles  the  Bold  the  treaty  of 
Peronne  marks  the  point  of  departure  of  new  conduct. 


1 6    REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

For  the  first  it  was  the  last  of  his  mistakes,  for  the  sec- 
ond the  commencement  of  dreams  and  of  unattainable 
enterprises.  While  the  King  of  France,  trusting  no  one 
because  he  had  been  deceived  by  all,  now  'refused  every 
risk,  even  when  he  had  two  chances  to  one,  the  Duke  of 
Burgundy  by  a  contrary  effect  believed  nothing  above  his 
strength,  inasmuch  as  he  saw  nothing  above  his  hopes. 

It  was  necessary  for  Louis  to  regain  the  lost  ground. 
He  made  his  brother  Charles  accept  Guyenne  instead  of 
Ambition  and  ^naniPagne,  which  would  so  well  have  suited 
death  of  the  the  Duke  of  Burgundy.  The  Duke  of  Brit- 
gumfy  (M77)Bur  tany  was  compelled  once  more  to  renounce 
any  foreign  alliance  ;  to  hold  him  more  firmly 
Louis  purchased  his  favorite  Lescun,  attached  to  himself 
the  powerful  Breton  family  of  Rohan,  and  afterward  caused 
those  rights  to  be  ceded  to  him  which  the  house  of  Blois 
claimed  to  possess  in  Brittany.  Two  traitors,  the  Cardinal 
la  Balue  and  the  Bishop  of  Verdun,  were  confined  in  iron 
cages,  where  they  remained  ten  years.  Two  others,  the  Duke 
of  Nemours  and  the  Count  of  Armagnac,  were  reduced — 
the  former  to  implore  pardon,  and  the  latter  to  flee  from  the 
kingdom,  abandoning  his  property,  which  the  king  confis- 
cated. At  the  same  time  to  the  King-maker,  Earl  War- 
wick, whom  he  reconciled  with  Margaret  of  Anjou,  Louis 
gave  the  means  of  overthrowing  in  England  Edward  IV., 
the  brother-in-law  of  the  Bold. 

Then,  sure  of  having  again  isolated  the  duke,  the  king 
dared  attack  him  openly.  He  convoked  at  Tours  an 
assembly  of  notables,  exposed  his  wrongs  at  length,  and 
obtained  a  declaration  from  the  assembly  stating  that 
Charles  by  his  hostile  acts  had  freed  the  king  from  the 
obligations  contracted  at  Peronne.  In  virtue  of  this  decla- 
ration the  king  seized  those  places  upon  the  Somme  which 
he  so  much  desired  and  which  were  within  his  reach — St. 
Quentin,  Roye,  Montdidier,  and  Amiens.  He  had  put  on 
foot  100,000  men,  and  the  duke  was  unprepared. 

But  the  dukes  of  Brittany  and  of  Guyenne  and  the  Con- 
stable of  St.  Pol,  the  chief  of  the  army,  terrified  by  the 
rapid  progress  of  the  king,  were  already  betraying  him. 
A  dauphin  was  born  the  preceding  year ;  the  Duke  of 
Guyenne,  being  no  longer  heir  to  the  crown,  was  interested 
in  reforming  anew  the  league  of  the  princes.  Louis,  seeing 
that  his  successes  slackened,  understood  that  new  plots 


CHAP.  II.]  FRANCE  FROM  1453    TO   1494.  I? 

were  forming.  He  believed  it  prudent  to  stop,  and  con- 
cluded a  truce  with  the  Duke  of  Burgundy.  This  was  nec- 
essary, inasmuch  as  Edward  IV.,  the  ally  of  Burgundy,  was 
at  that  moment  once  more  reascending  the  English  throne. 

So  Louis  XI.  again  had  to  break  the  thousand  fetters 
with  which  the  aristocracy  sought  to  bind  the  royalty.  The 
question  was  of  nothing  less  than  the  dismemberment  of 
France.  "  I  care  more  for  the  good  of  France  than  they 
think,"  said  the  Duke  of  Burgundy,  "  for  instead  of  one 
king  as  now  I  would  have  six."  The  court  of  the  Duke  of 
Guyenne  was  the  center  of  all  these  intrigues.  Through 
him  a  new  and  powerful  feudal  house  was  again  forming. 
The  Duke  of  Burgundy  offered  him  the  hand  of  Mary,  his 
only  daughter ;  that  is  to  say,  the  hope  of  uniting  his 
possessions  of  Aquitaine,  states  more  extended,  more 
populous,  more  rich,  than  those  of  the  king  himself.  The 
young  duke  was  therefore  the  greatest  obstacle  which 
inconvenienced  the  king. 

This  obstacle  disappeared  :  the  prince  died.  Was  he 
poisoned  ?  If  so,  was  his  being  poisoned  the  work  of  the 
king  ?  These  are  questions  which  history  cannot  answer. 
But  if  the  guilt  of  the  king  on  this  point  remains  in  doubt, 
there  is  no  question  as  to  the  atrocious  joy  which  he  felt 
at  the  sickness  and  then  at  the  death  of  his  brother. 

This  event  destroyed  all  the  plans  of  the  Bold.  Never- 
theless, since  he  was  ready,  he  crossed  the  Somme  and 
invaded  the  kingdom,  swearing  to  put  everything  to  fire 
and  sword,  though  the  truce  he  had  concluded  with  Louis 
XI.  was  not  yet  expired.  This  war  was  carried  on  with 
atrocious  cruelty.  At  Nesle  men,  women,  and  children 
had  fled  to  the  large  church  :  they  were  massacred  there 
together. 

The  inhabitants  of  Beauvais  profited  by  such  a  warning, 
and  when,  June  27,  1472,  the  Burgundian  army  arrived 
under  their  walls  they  valiantly  sustained  an  assault  which 
lasted  eleven  hours  ;  the  women  themselves  took  part  in 
the  defense.  One  of  them,  Jeanne  Hachette,  tore  away  a 
Burgundian  standard  that  a  soldier  had  already  planted 
upon  the  rampart.  The  duke,  arrested  by  this  heroism,  was 
compelled  to  retire.  He  took  his  revenge  by  burning  St. 
Valery,  Eu,  and  Neufchateau  ;  he  failed  before  Dieppe  and 
encamped  under  the  walls  of  Rouen,  where  he  had  appointed 
a  rendezvous,  it  was  said,  with  the  Duke  of  Brittany.  He 


1 8    REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.      [BOOK  I. 

remained  there  four  days.  Then,  accusing  Francis  II.  of 
not  keeping  his  promise,  he  returned  to  his  states. 

If  the  duke  Francis  II.  had  failed  at  his  rendezvous  it 
was  because  Louis  XI.  had  made  against  him  furious  war. 
He  had  captured  from  him  la  Guerche,  Machecoul,  Ancenis, 
and  Chantoce  ;  and  then,  after  having  terrified  him  by  his 
successes,  he  had  offered  him  an  advantageous  peace.  The 
duke  signed  it  October  18,  and  October  23  Charles  the  Bold, 
a  little  before  so  untractable,  himself  accepted  the  truce  of 
Senlis. 

Thus  the  treaty  of  Peronne,  which  was  supposed  to  have 
laid  the  King  of  France  so  low,  was  rendered  null.  The 
shame  of  Liege  was  compensated  in  the  eyes  of  Louis  XI. 
by  the  shame  of  Beauvais.  And  if  the  king  had  emerged 
with  so  much  good  fortune  and  address  from  so  evil  a  case, 
what  would  he  not  accomplish  in  future  with  larger  re- 
sources and  fewer  embarrassments  ?  As  to  the  resources,  he 
was  increasing  them  by  an  able  and  firm  administration. 
As  to  the  embarrassments,  the  Bold  seemed  to  have  given 
himself  the  task  of  diminishing  them  by  attempting  the 
realization  of  projects  above  his  strength. 

Beginning  with  1472  all  the  attention  of  the  Duke  of 
Burgundy  was  directed  toward  Germany,  Lorraine,  and 
Switzerland.  The  affairs  of  France  had  for  him  only  sec- 
ondary importance.  An  Austrian  prince,  Sigismund,  had 
just  pledged  to  him  the  landgravate  of  Upper  Alsace  and 
the  county  of  Ferrette  ;  he  bought  Guelderland  and  the 
county  of  Zutphen  (1469).  Seeing  his  domains  thus  in- 
creased in  the  valleys  of  the  Meuse  and  Rhine,  he  dreamed 
of  reuniting  all  the  countries  which  had  formerly  composed 
the  share  of  King  Lothaire  and  of  forming  a  new  kingdom 
under  the  name  of  Belgian  Gaul.  His  states  formed  two 
separate  groups  which  could  have  been  urwted  by  Cham- 
pagne, Lorraine,  and  Alsace.  He  had  missed  Champagne, 
but  he  held  Alsace  ;  he  expected  without  difficulty  to  take 
Lorraine;  Switzerland  would  come  afterward,  then  Provence; 
and  Lotharingia  would  be  reconstituted.  He  commenced 
where  he  ought  to  have  finished.  He  sought  from  the 
emperor  the  title  of  king  (1473).  Louis  prevented  the 
success  of  his  negotiations. 

On  this  side  he  failed  ;  on  the  other  he  saw  a  league 
forming  between  Rene  II.,  the  young  Duke  of  Lorraine,  the 
archduke  Sigismund,  the  cities  of  the  Rhine,  which  felt 


CHAP.  II.]  FRANCE  FROM  1453    TO   1494.  19 

themselves  menaced,  the  Swiss,  whom  Hagenbach,  his  agent 
in  Alsace,  had  annoyed  in  their  commerce  by  a  thousand 
exactions,  and  finally  the  eternal  enemy,  the  King  of  France, 
the  instigator  of  this  coalition  which  wove  its  meshes 
around  the  Burgundian  states.  Suddenly  the  archduke 
brought  him  the  100,000  florins  agreed  upon  for  the  ransom 
of  Alsace  ;  Hagenbach  was  seized  and  beheaded  by  the 
inhabitants  of  Brisach  (1474).  Together  with  this  news  the 
duke  received  the  solemn  defiance  of  the  Swiss,  who  entered 
Franche  Comte  and  gained  over  the  Burgundians  the  bloody 
battle  of  Hericourt.  And  these  events  occurred  at  the  very 
moment  when  he  was  himself  engaged  in  another  war  to 
sustain  the  Archbishop  of  Cologne  against  the  Pope,  the 
emperor,  and  his  subjects.  In  behalf  of  this  prince  he 
was  besieging  the  little  city  of  Neuss,  which  resisted  eleven 
months.  While  he  was  here  losing  both  his  time  and 
strength,  his  brother-in-law  and  ally,  Edward  IV.,  at  last 
landed  at  Calais. 

Edward  expected  a  short  and  glorious  campaign.  His 
hopes  were  dissipated  after  he  had  made  a  few  marches  in 
the  interior  of  the  country.  The  Burgundian  cities  did  not 
open  their  gates  to  receive  the  ally  of  the  Duke  of  Burgundy; 
the  Burgundian  soldiers  did  not  appear  in  order  to  join  the 
English  troops,  who  found  themselves  without  shelter  or 
magazines.  He  counted  at  least  on  entering  St.  Quentin, 
which  was  commanded  by  St.  Pol,  the  secret  ally  of  Charles 
the  Bold.  He  was  received  by  cannon  shot.  Deceived  and 
irritated,  he  hastened  to  accept  the  favorable  conditions  by 
which  Louis  offered  to  treat.  By  the  peace  of  Pecquigny 
"the  two  kings  promised  to  assist  each  other  against  their 
rebellious  subjects  ;  furthermore,  Edward  obtained  75,000 
crowns  in  ready  money  and  a  life  annuity  of  50,000  (August 

29,  1475)- 

Then  the  Bold  also  found  it  very  necessary  to  make  peace. 
The  following  September  he  signed  the  treaty  of  Soleure 
with  the  King  of  France  in  order  to  terminate  his  affairs 
with  Lorraine  and  Switzerland.  In  fact  November  30  he 
entered  Nancy.  Lorraine,  abandoned  by  the  king,  who  had, 
however,  been  the  first  to  instigate  Rene"  to  take  arms,  was 
conquered.  Forthwith  Charles  turned  against  the  Swiss, 
who  burned  and  plundered  at  their  ease  in  Franche  Comte". 
He  attacked  them  in  dead  winter  with  an  army  of  18,000 
men  who  had  just  made  two  exhausting  campaigns.  He 


20     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  J. 

was  completely  beaten  at  Granson  (March,  1476),  and  three 
months  after  at  Moral. 

At  this  news  Lorraine  rose  and  recalled  the  young  Rene 
de  Vaudemont.  This  last  affront  made  the  Bold  lose  all 
prudence.  He  got  together  in  haste  6000  mercenaries  and 
rushed  to  Nancy.  But  Rene  found  soldiers  with  the  money 
of  Louis  XL;  the  Swiss,  on  whose  side  he  fought  at  Morat, 
came  to  his  aid.  The  Bold  was  unwilling  to  retreat  and 
accepted  an  unequal  battle.  In  a  few  hours  the  Burgun- 
dians  were  routed  and  the  "  Grand  Duke  of  the  West  " 
remained  among  the  dead  (1477). 

While  Charles  the  Bold  was  dashing  himself  against  the 

Germans,  the  people  of  Lorraine,  and  the  Swiss,  Louis  XI. 

Ruin    of   the   nad  profited  by  the  respite  afforded  to  settle 

Great      Feudal   njs  accounts  with  those  who  had   so   many 

Houses.     Death       .  •,..«.«  r\  e   ^i 

of  Louis  xi.  times  turned  against  him.  One  of  the  first 
(I48a)>  who  had  to  render  this  difficult  account  was 

the  Duke  of  Alencon.  This  duke,  condemned  to  death 
under  Charles  VII.,  had  been  pardoned  by  Louis  XL,  but 
he  assassinated  those  who  gave  testimony  against  him, 
coined  false  money,  and  entered  into  plots  against  the  king. 
Arrested  in  1473,  ne  was  tne  following  year  condemned 
for  the  second  time  to  capital  punishment.  Louis  XI.  kept 
him  in  prison  until  his  death.  He  left  a  son  ;  those  who 
had  appropriated  the  goods  of  his  father  implicated  him 
in  a  plot  of  high  treason,  then  had  him  condemned  to  give 
up  all  his  castles  to  the  king,  to  demand  pardon,  and  to 
endure  perpetual  confinement  (1481). 

There  were  complaints,  very  serious  in  another  sense,  to 
bring  against  the  Count  of  Armagnac,  that  horrible  John 
V.  who  had  espoused  his  sister  Isabella,  and  forced  the 
chaplain  to  bless  this  incestuous  marriage  by  threatening 
to  throw  him  into  the  river  if  he  made  difficulty.  His 
arrest  having  been  decreed  by  Parliament,  he  had  been 
condemned  for  incest,  murder,  and  forgery  under  Charles 
VII.,  but  had  fled  ;  and  one  of  the  first  acts  of  Louis  XI. 
on  his  accession  had  been  to  restore  him  his  domains. 
This  frightful  man  cherished  for  the  king  the  gratitude  to 
be  expected  :  he  was  constantly  with  his  enemies.  It  was 
only  in  1473  tnat  tne  king  could  concern  himself  with  him. 
Cardinal  d'Alby  came  with  an  army  to  besiege  Lectoure. 
The  city  resisted.  Negotiations  followed  ;  and  while  they 
negotiated  the  cardinal  seized  one  of  the  gates  of  the  city. 


CHAP.  II.]  FRANCE  FROM  1453    TO   1494.  21 

John  V.  of  Armagnac  was  stabbed  before  the  eyes  of  his 
wife.  The  latter  was  enceinte.  They  gave  her  poison. 
Of  all  the  population  of  Lectoure  three  men  and  four 
women  survived. 

In  this  house  of  Armagnac  there  was  a  younger  branch, 
that  of  Nemours,  whose  chief,  loaded  with  goods  and 
honors  by  Louis  XI.,  betrayed  him  ten  times.  Freed  from 
the  Burgundians  and  the  English,  Louis  besieged  and  cap- 
tured the  Duke  of  Nemours  in  his  castle  of  Carlat  and 
shut  him  up  in  the  castle  of  Pierre-Encise,  a  prison  so 
frightful  that  the  hair  of  the  prisoner  became  white  in  a 
few  days.  Then  he  had  him  carried  to  the  Bastille,  chained 
and  placed  in  an  iron  cage  ;  he  ordered  that  he  should  be 
allowed  to  go  out  from  it  only  for  torture,  that  the 
severest  torture  should  be  inflicted,  and  that  he  should 
be  made  to  confess.  Nemours,  condemned  to  death,  was 
beheaded  in  the  market-place. 

A  brother  of  John  V.  of  Armagnac  and  a  member  of  the 
powerful  house  of  d'Albret,  both  also  guilty  of  plots  against 
the  king,  were  the  former  imprisoned,  the  latter  beheaded. 
These  severe  executions  ended  by  teaching  respect  of  law 
and  the  king  to  the  so  often  rebellious  lords  of  the  south. 

The  King  of  Aragon  had  given  Roussillon  in  pledge  to 
Louis  XI.  for  200,000  crowns.  But  he  intended  not  to 
pay  the  money,  but  to  regain  the  province,  whose  spirit  of 
hostility  to  the  French  he  fomented  secretly.  In  1474 
Louis  XI.  cut  these  intrigues  short  by  sending  a  good  army 
which  captured  Perpignan  after  a  siege  of  eight  months, 
endured  with  admirable  constancy.  One  woman,  it  was 
said,  had  nourished  one  of  her  children  with  the  body  of 
another  who  had  died  of  famine. 

In  the  north  there  was  a  man  to  punish  who,  like  Jacques 
of  Nemours,  was  nobody  save  by  Louis  XL,  to  whom  with 
the  title  of  Constable*  Louis  XI.  had  intrusted  the  Sword 


*  The  title  of  constable  originally  indicated  the  commander  of  the 
cavalry,  comes  stabuli,  whence  the  name  is  derived.  From  1218  to 
1627,  when  the  office  was  suppressed,  the  Constable  of  France  was  com- 
mander-in-chief  of  the  army  in  the  absence  of  the  king.  The  insignia  of 
his  office  was  a  naked  sword,  called  the  Sword  of  France,  which  he 
received  from  the  hands  of  the  king.  His  emoluments,  like  his  privileges 
and  power,  were  enormous.  After  the  execution  of  the  traitor  Louis  of 
Luxemburg,  Count  of  St.  Pol,  the  office  remained  vacant  forty  years  till 
the  appointment  in  1515  of  Charles  of  Bourbon,  ultimately  a  still  greater 


22     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

of  France,  the  defense  of  the  kingdom.  This  man,  the 
Count  of  St.  Pol,  had  resolved  to  create  for  himself  an 
independent  kingdom  at  the  expense  of  England,  France, 
and  Burgundy.  He  had  toiled  at  it  during  ten  years, 
employing  only  one  means  to  succeed,  deceiving  by  turns 
the  English,  French,  and  Burgundians,  but  forgetting  that 
the  day  might  come  when  the  King  of  France,  the  King  of 
England,  and  the  Duke  of  Burgundy  would  exchange  the 
letters  which  he  had  written  them.  Louis  was  the  most 
implacable.  At  the  approach  of  the  French  troops  the 
constable  fled  to  Mons.  The  king  wrote  him  to  return 
without  fear.  "I  am  in  great  difficulties,"  he  wrote  him  ; 
"  I  have  much  need  of  a  head  like  yours  "  ;  and  he  added 
before  those  who  were  present  for  fear  they  should  mistake  : 
"  It  is  only  the  head  which  I  wish  ;  the  body  can  stay  where 
it  is."  The  Duke  of  Burgundy  gave  him  up  ;  he  was 
decapitated  in  the  Place  de  Greve  (1475). 

But  of  all  these  deaths  the  most  fortunate  for  the  king 
was  that  of  the  Bold.  His  was  really  the  death  of  feudal- 
ism. "  Never  afterward  did  the  King  of  France  find,"  said 
Comines,  "  a  man  bold  enough  to  raise  his  head  against 
him  or  to  contradict  his  will."  The  duke  left  only  a  daugh- 
ter. The  king  tried  to  take  the  heiress  and  the  heritage. 
He  put  forward  a  project  of  marriage  between  Mary  of 
Burgundy,  who  was  twenty  years  old,  and  the  dauphin,  who 
was  eight.  But  counting  little  upon  so  inappropriate  a 
marriage,  he  made  certain  of  a  part  of  the  dowry  by  seizing 
under  various  pretexts  Burgundy,  Picardy,  and  Artoi.s. 
Mary,  despoiled  and  betrayed  by  the  king,  who,  giving  to 
the  Flemings  one  of  her  letters,  brought  about  the  death  of 
her  two  counselors,  Hugonet  and  Humbercourt,  threw  her- 
self into  the  arms  of  Austria.  She  espoused  the  archduke 
Maximilian  :  a  fatal  marriage,  whence  issued  the  monstrous 
power  of  Charles  V.,  and  which  became  for  the  houses  of 
France  and  Austria  the  first  cause  of  a  struggle  lasting  two 
centuries.  This  struggle  at  its  origin  under  Louis  XI.  had 
not  the  gravity  which  it  afterward  acquired.  It  was  marked 
by  only  one  battle,  that  of  Guinegate,  which  was  lost  by 
the  French  (1479).  Louis  none  the  less  succeeded  in 

and  more  injurious  traitor,  commonly  called  The  Constable.  The  title 
was  revived  for  a  few  years  under  the  empire  of  Napoleon  in  favor  of 
his  brother  Louis. — ED. 


CHAP.  II.]  FRANCE  FROM  1453    TO   1494.  23 

definitely  incorporating  Burgundy  and  Picardy  with  the 
territory  of  Boulogne  into  the  royal  domain,  and  obtained, 
moreover,  the  cession  of  Artois  and  Franche  Comte  as 
dowry  of  the  daughter  of  Maximilian,  who  was  promised  to 
the  dauphin  (treaty  of  Arras,  1482). 

He  did  not  long  survive  this  treaty,  which  was  the  coro- 
nation of  his  entire  reign.  Withdrawn  to  his  inaccessible 
castle  of  Plessis-les-Tours,  a  prey  to  remorse  and  super- 
stitious terrors,  he  there  long  struggled  against  death.  He 
had  made  the  monk  Francisco  de  Paolo  come  from  Calabria, 
hoping  that  his  prayers  might  prolong  his  life,  and  had 
caused  the  cultan  Baiezid  to  send  him  all  the  relics  found 
at  Constantinople.  Remedies,  prayers  to  Heaven,  desires 
of  life,  were  useless.  "It  all  accomplished  nothing,"  said 
Comines  ;  "  he  was  obliged  to  pass  the  way  that  the  others 
had  passed."  Warned  at  last  by  his  physician,  Coittier,  who 
had  extorted  from  him  50,000  crowns  in  five  months,  that 
he  must  die,  he  resigned  himself,  sent  for  his  son  the  dau- 
phin, who  had  been  reared  in  isolation  at  the  castle  of 
Amboise,  gave  him  excellent  counsels — such  as  always  are 
given  at  such  an  hour — and  the  famous  maxim,  "  He  who 
does  not  know  how  to  dissimulate  does  not  know  how  to 
reign."  He  expired  August  30,  1483.  That  very  year 
Luther  and  Rabelais  were  born,  two  other  representatives 
of  the  new  epoch  that  was  commencing. 

Thus  after  twenty  years  of  effort  the  king  saw  "  the 
house  of  Burgundy  feeble  and  powerless  ;  the  Duke  of 
Burgundy  unable  to  undertake  anything,  and  held  in  check 
by  the  great  number  of  warlike  peoples  upon  his  frontier  ; 
Spain  in  peace  with  Louis  and  fearful  of  his  arms  ;  England 
weakened  and  herself  in  trouble  ;  Scotland  absolutely  his 
own  ;  many  allies  in  Germany,  and  the  Swiss  as  submissive 
as  his  own  subjects."  Bossuet  says  too  much  in  regard  to 
the  Swiss,  whose  affection  for  the  king  was  due  simply  to 
the  gold  which  he  sowed  lavishly  in  their  country  ;  but  he 
does  not  say  enough  about  the  interior  of  France.  To  the 
four  provinces  gained  from  Burgundy  (the  duchy  and  the 
county,  together  with  Charolais  and  Auxerre,  Artois  and 
Picardy  with  the  territory  of  Boulogne)  there  must  be 
added  Maine,  Provence,  and  Anjou,  bequeathed  him  by 
will.  A  lawsuit  had  gained  him  the  duchy  of  Alencon  and 
Perche  ;  the  death  of  his  brother,  Guyenne  ;  his  interven- 
tion in  the  affairs  of  Spain,  Roussillon  and  Cerdagne  : 


24    REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.      [BOOK  I. 

altogether  eleven  provinces  united  to  the  crown  domain, 
not  counting  the  profits  of  the  executions  of  St.  Pol,  Ne- 
mours, and  Armagnac. 

He -had  instituted  posts,  multiplied  fairs  and  markets, 
encouraged  commerce  and  manufactures,  and  called  to 
France  the  earliest  printers. 

"Louis  XL,"  says  one  of  his  historians,  "was  equally 
renowned  for  his  vices  and  virtues,  and  everything  reckoned 
in  the  scale,  he  was  a  king."  France  owes  him  much,  but 
she  has  not  been  able  to  absolve  him  for  believing  that  all 
means  were  good  for  attaining  a  useful  end. 

The  successor  of  Louis  XL  was  a  child  of  thirteen  years 

and  two  months,  of  age  by  law,  but  feeble  in  body  and 

mind,   and    destined    long   to  remain   under 

char?esreigvinf  guardianship.     He  was  under  the  protection 

until  the  Italian   of  his  elder  sister,   Anne  of  Beaujeu,  "the 

expedition.  .  /•       i-    i_  •         ^i  U    •»      i 

least  foolish  woman  in  the  world ,  her 
father  Louis  XL  was  wont  to  say.  His  good  qualities  she 
possessed  without  the  bad  ones.  A  violent  reaction  broke 
out  against  the  policy  of  the  dead  king  ;  and  the  most  com- 
promised of  his  ministers — Olivier  the  Devil,  Daniel  and 
John  Doyat — were  its  victims.  But  the  grandees  wished 
still  more,  even  the  nullification  of  the  principal  acts  of 
Louis  XL  In  this  hope  they  demanded  the  convocation  of 
the  States  General. 

They  obtained  it,  but  the  deputies,  especially  those  of 
the  third  estate,  did  not  wish  to  be  used  as  instruments  of 
feudal  resentment.  Very  bold  discourses  were  pronounced  ; 
one  still  reads  with  astonishment  that  of  a  noble,  Philip 
Pot,  Lord  of  la  Roche,  upon  the  obligations  of  princes  and 
the  rights  of  the  peoples.  The  States  left  to  Anne  of 
Beaujeu  full  power  by  leaving  to  her  the  guardianship  of 
the  king's  person,  upon  whose  mind  she  exercised  great 
influence,  and  who,  being  of  age,  possessed,  or  rather  left  to 
her,  full  royal  authority. 

They  instituted  a  governmental  council  over  which  in 
the  absence  of  the  king  the  Duke  of  Orleans  was  to  preside, 
and  when  he  was  not  present  the  Duke  of  Bourbon  or  the 
Lord  of  Beaujeu.  The  Lady  of  Beaujeu  was  not  even  named 
in  this  act ;  the  Duke  of  Orleans,  on  the  contrary,  remained 
the  ostensible  chief  of  the  government,  and  thought  himself 
so  in  reality.  However,  the  Lady  of  Beaujeu,  who  had 
accustomed  her  brother  to  obey  and  fear  her,  by  making 


CHAP.  II.]          FRANCE  FROM  1453    TO  1494  25 

him  preside  at  the  council,  thrust  aside  the  Duke  of  Orleans, 
and  by  making  her  husband,  the  plain  Lord  of  Beaujeu,  pre- 
side over  it,  she  crowded  from  it  the  Duke  of  Alengon,  the 
Duke  of  Angouleme,  and  the  other  princes  of  the  blood,  who 
with  higher  qualifications  were  unwilling  to  sit  below  him. 
Thus  without  anyone  foreseeing  it,  was  constituted  what 
was  called  the  government  of  Madame,  whereby  was  to  be 
continued  the  firm  and  energetic  policy  of  Louis  XI. 

The  Duke  of  Orleans  was  not  slow  to  see  that  he  had 
been  outplayed.  Then  he  had  recourse  to  plots.  To  this 
Anne  put  an  end  like  a  worthy  daughter  of  Louis  XL 
She  ordered  the  arrest  of  the  prince.  He  escaped,  saving 
himself  by  whip  and  spur  at  the  very  moment  when  he  was 
about  to  be  seized,  and  began  a  civil  war.  He  drew  to  his 
side  the  Duke  of  Brittany,  Francis  II.,  made  alliance  with 
Maximilian,  who  reproached  himself  for  the  concessions  of 
the  treaty  of  Arras,  and  even  solicited  the  aid  of  Richard 
III.,  King  of  England. 

Anne  of  Beaujeu  counteracted  all.  She  kept  Richard  III. 
in  his  kingdom  by  giving  aid  in  men  and  money  to  his 
competitor,  Henry  of  Richmond,  who  soon  became  King  of 
England  as  Henry  VII.;  against  Maximilian  she  treated 
with  the  States  of  Flanders,  who  acted  in  the  name  of  their 
prince,  still  a  child,  Duke  Philip  of  Austria  ;  against  the 
Duke  of  Brittany  she  made  alliance  with  the  nobility  of 
the  country,  who  were  irritated  by  the  favor  shown  Landais 
the  detested  minister  of  Francis  II.  Landais  was  seized 
and  hung.  At  once  La  Tremoille  hastened  to  besiege  the 
Duke  of  Orleans  in  Baugency,  there  took  him  prisoner,  and 
obliged  him  to  return  to  the  court  in  order  to  promise  that 
he  would  hereafter  occupy  himself  only  with  his  pleasures. 

But  Maximilian,  named  some  months  later  King  of  the 
Romans,  that  is  to  say,  heir  of  the  imperial  crown,  broke 
the  treaty  of  Arras.  The  league  of  princes  was  formed 
anew,  a  league  of  public  welfare  as  genuine  as  that  of 
twenty  years  earlier  !  Anne  had  not  committed  the  faults 
of  Louis  XL  More  resources  were  in  her  hands  and  she 
used  them  wisely.  While  d'Esquerdes  delayed  Maximil- 
ian in  Artois  (1487),  and  there  captured  St.  Omer  and 
Terouanne,  she  put  at  the  head  of  an  army  full  of  ardor 
the  young  king,  who  was  all  joyous  at  seeing  himself  on 
horseback  in  splendid  armor,  and  they  marched  against 
the  confederates  of  the  south.  Everywhere  the  citizens 


26         REVOLUTION  IN   THE  POLITICAL   ORDER. 

armed  against  the  lords,  against  their  garrisons  ;  in  a  few 
days  "  the  tasks  of  the  south  were  regulated."  Anne  then 
returned  against  Brittany.  La  Tremoille  entered  the 
duchy  with  the  French  troops  April,  1488  ;  he  took  posses- 
sion of  Chateaubriant,  Ancenis,  and  Fougeres,  and  beat  the 
Breton  army  (July  27)  at  St.  Aubin  du  Cormier.  The 
Duke  of  Orleans  was  captured.  At  the  north  affairs  were 
no  less  prosperous.  The  Flemings,  roused  against  Maxi- 
milian, drove  from  their  country  his  German  troops  and 
obliged  him  to  sign  a  new  convention  on  the  basis  of  the 
treaty  of  Arras  of  1482.  So  the  Lady  of  Beaujeu  triumphed 
over  all  the  coalitions  and  preserved  the  conquests  of  her 
father.  To  them  she  added  a  great  province. 

Francis  II.,  Duke  of  Brittany,  had  just  died  without  other 
heir  than  his  young  daughter  Anne.  A  province  which 
rounded  out  the  kingdom  toward  the  west  could  not  be 
allowed  to  fall  into  foreign  hands.  Anne  of  Beaujeu  used 
every  means,  even  force,  to  bring  about  the  marriage  of  the 
king  with  the  young  duchess.  Charles  VIII.  went,  the 
helmet  on  his  head,  to  conquer  his  bride  and  the  duchy. 
Anne  of  Brittany,  besieged  in  Rennes  and  abandoned  by 
Maximilian,  who  had,  however,  betrothed  her  by  procuration, 
consented  to  espouse  Charles  VIII.  ^(1491).  The  last 
asylum  of  princely  independence  was  opened  to  the  royal 
authority,  and  the  most  obstinate  of  provincial  individuali- 
ties had  just  merged  itself  like  the  rest  in  that  great  whole 
of  the  kingdom  of  France.  The  rebel  princes  no  longer 
had  a  place  of  refuge  where  they  could  lift  their  banner 
against  the  king.  Their  contemporaries  called  the  last 
war  which  they  made  the  foolish  war,  and  those  which  they 
undertook  in  the  future  were  to  be  more  foolish  still.  The 
royalty  of  France  has  therefore  become  its  own  master  ; 
let  us  see  how  that  of  England  reached  the  same  state. 


FRANCE 

UNDER  LOUIS  XI. 
1401-1483 


Royal  Possessions 
Acquisitions  of  Louis  XI 
Feudal  Possessions 
Spanisli  Possessions 


,-      /f/'(      '  £        gt^cJ^*    ^~- 
i'J  .,J>3fejSf^U™*™*  ,,l 


:ude      4       East  IVotii       6      Greenwich 


K.  F.  Fisk.Eni'i-.  N.  \. 


CHAPTER   III. 
ENGLAND   FROM    1453   TO    1509. 


State  of  England  at  the  Middle  of  the  Fifteenth  Century. — War  of  the 
Roses  (1455-85). — Henry  VII.  Tudor  (1485-1509). — Suppression 
of  Public  Liberties. 

IN   England  as  in    France  a  powerful  aristocracy  held 

the  monarchy  in  check.     But  while  in  France  the  people 

was  the  ally  of  the  king  against  the  feudal 

State   of  Eng-  ....  .-'_,        .         ,.°      0      ,,-,         •   , 

land  at  the  mid-  nobility,  in  England  it  was  allied  with  the 
teenth  century,  nobility  against  the  king,  and  the  monarchy 
had  been  compelled,  from  the  time  of  King 
John,  in  Magna  Charta  to  recognize  and  proclaim  national 
rights.  During  almost  two  centuries  Parliament,  com- 
posed of  two  chambers,  the  House  of  Lords  or  Upper 
House,  and  the  House  of  Commons  or  Lower  House,  had 
been  invested  with  the  right  of  voting  taxes,  of  regulating 
their  nature,  of  fixing  their  amount,  and  of  supervising  their 
employment.  The  king  meanwhile  could  not  raise  a  penny 
without  its  consent.  Parliament  also  decided  questions  of 
succession  to  the  throne  and  of  regency,  and  voted  sub- 
sidies only  after  the  king  had  satisfied  its  complaints.  It 
is  true  that  its  sessions  were  not  regularly  fixed,  that  the 
court  had  a  considerable  influence  over  its  individual 
members ;  but  this  great  body  was  none  the  less  considered 
the  stern  guardian  of  English  liberties  and  as  one  of  the 
two  essential  elements  of  national  sovereignty.  By  it  new 
laws  were  to  be  approved. 

The  life  and  liberty  of  individuals  as  well  as  their  future 
were  protected  against  the  excess  of  power  or  the  errors 
of  governmental  agents.  It  was  a  principle  recognized 
and  practiced  in  England  that  a  man  could  not  be  arrested 
and  detained  without  the  order  of  a  magistrate,  and  could 
be  judged  only  by  his  peers — the  lords  by  the  Upper 
House,  the  other  citizens  by  a  jury  sitting  in  public 
session  in  the  county  where  the  crime  had  been  committed, 


28     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

and  pronouncing  a  unanimous  decision,  which  was  without 
appeal.  Without  doubt  there  was  more  than  one  instance 
of  arbitrary  judgment,  but  there  were  no  exceptional  tribu- 
nals. There  were  transient  abuses  which  could  not  formu- 
late themselves  into  fixed  law.  Finally,  every  royal  officer 
could  be  prosecuted  for  abuse  of  power  without  having  the 
right  to  invoke  a  royal  order  as  his  excuse.  The  ministers 
themselves  could  be  impeached  by  Parliament. 

England  was  then  already,  if  we  consider  only  its  institu- 
tions, in  advance  of  all  other  states.  But  it  had  few  manu- 
factures, and  little  commerce,  so  that  material  interests  were 
not  strong  enough  to  dominate  political  questions.  More- 
over, excessive  violence  characterized  the  habits  of  the 
people.  In  all  classes  aggressive  and  ferocious  instincts 
had  been  developed  to  a  high  degree  by  the  Hundred 
Years'  War.  The  fury  shown  in  the  conflict  against 
France  was  to  manifest  itself  anew  in  civil  struggles. 

This  civil  strife  originated  in  the  rivalry  of  the  houses 
of  York  and  Lancaster,  the  White  and  the  Red  Rose. 

The   victories   of    Crecy,    Poitiers,  and    Agincourt   had 

inspired  in  the  English  that  patriotic  and  boundless  pride 

which  has  made  them  accomplish  so  great 

WRosesthc  achievements,  and  which  has  remained  the 
distinctive  trait  of  their  national  character. 
It  was  the  misfortune  of  the  house  of  Lancaster,  then 
represented  by  Henry  VI.,  that  it  was  powerless  to  satisfy 
this  pride,  and  that  it  had  to  answer  for  the  cruel  assaults 
it  received  daily  through  defeats  in  France  after  the  appear- 
ance of  Joan  of  Arc,  and  especially  after  the  death  of  the 
Duke  of  Bedford.  At  each  bad  news  arriving  from  the 
Continent  universal  clamors  arose  against  the  ministers. 
First  was  Mans,  surrendered  by  order  of  Suffolk,  then 
Rouen  which  opened  its  gates,  then  a  great  pitched  battle — 
that  of  Fourmigny — lost  by  the  English,  then  Bordeaux, 
which  beheld  Dunois  penetrate  its  walls  in  triumph. 

Under  the  blow  of  so  many  disasters  they  remembered 
that  the  ruling  dynasty  after  the  deposition  of  Richard  II. 
had  usurped  the  throne,  and  that  Richard,  Duke  of  York, 
was  the  legitimate  heir.  He  descended  in  direct  line  on 
his  mother's  side  from  the  second  son  of  Edward  III. — in 
England  women  inherit  and  transmit  rights  to  the  throne — 
and  on  his  father's  side  from  the  fourth  son.  Henry  VI. 
descended  only  from  the  third  son  of  Edward  IV.  The 


CHAP.  III.]        ENGLAND  FROM  1453    TO   1509.  29 

house  of  Lancaster  was  strong  in  being  the  origina.  choice 
of  the  nation,  in  its  uncontested  possession  of  the  throne 
during  sixty  years,  and  it  invoked  the  oath  of  fidelity  of  the 
Duke  of  York  himself.  But  the  mental  feebleness  which 
Henry  VI.  had  inherited  from  his  maternal  grandfather, 
Charles  VI.,  was  degenerating  into  real  imbecility :  his 
wife,  Margaret  of  Anjou,  found  herself  alone  to  confront 
popular  resentment.  Already  an  object  of  suspicion  to  the 
English  through  her  French  origin,  the  queen  was  hated 
after  the  murder  of  the  Duke  of  Gloucester,  that  brother 
of  the  glorious  Henry  V.,  who  was  commonly  called  the 
good  duke,  because  he  always  wished  war  with  France,  and 
whom  she  had  arrested  in  1447,  and  put  to  death  two  days 
later  in  his  prison.  According  as  the  war  went  on  dis- 
astrously upon  the  Continent  so  much  the  more  did  hate 
increase  against  her,  whom  they  made  responsible  for  all 
their  misfortunes,  and  who  at  her  marriage  instead  of  bring- 
ing a  dowry  to  her  husband  had  obtained  the  evacuation  of 
Anjou  and  Maine  by  the  English  troops.  The  Duke  of 
York  believed  the  occasion  favorable.  First,  he  incited  the 
Commons  to  accuse  the  favorite  minister,  the  Duke  of 
Suffolk,  and  to  refuse  all  subsidies  until  he  had  been  judged. 
The  king  to  save  the  accused  from  a  death  sentence  con- 
demned him  to  five  years'  banishment.  Two  thousand  per- 
sons endeavored  to  arrest  Suffolk  on  his  departure  from 
prison.  He  was,  however,  able  to  gain  the  port  of  Ipswich, 
whence  he  speedily  set  sail.  He  thought  himself  safe, 
when  he  was  overtaken  by  Nicholas  of  the  Tower,  one  of 
the  largest  vessels  of  the  royal  navy.  He  was  ordered  to 
come  on  board,  and  when  he  reached  the  deck  the  captain 
saluted  him  with  the  words,  "Welcome,  traitor."  The  fol- 
lowing day  the  unhappy  man  underwent  a  mock  trial 
before  the  sailors.  A  boat  was  alongside.  It  contained  a 
block,  a  rusty  sword,  and  an  executioner.  The  duke  was 
let  down  into  it.  The  executioner  struck  off  his  head,  but 
only  at  the  sixth  blow.  The  tragedy  was  hardly  finished 
when  another  commenced. 

Mortimer  of  York  had  been  beheaded  in  1445.  An 
Irishman,  Jack  Cade,  pretended  to  be  this  prince,  and  to 
have  escaped  his  executioners  ;  he  speedily  stirred  up 
revolt  in  the  county  of  Kent.  He  assembled  as  many  as 
60,000  men,  and  was  during  several  days  master  of  London. 
But  the  adventurer  could  not  maintain  discipline  among  his 


3°     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

followers.  The  citizens  took  arms  to  protect  themselves 
from  pillage.  The  promise  of  amnesty  finally  dispersed 
the  insurgents.  Cade,  on  whose  head  a  price  had  been 
put,  fell  into  a  trap  and  was  slain. 

Richard  of  York  had  been  connected  with  this  insurrec- 
tion, but  no  one  dared  touch  him.  Emboldened  by  im- 
punity and  by  the  feebleness  of  the  Lancastrians,  which  the 
easy  success  of  Cade  had  shown,  he  raised  a  small  army, 
presented  himself  at  the  gates  of  London,  and  demanded 
that  the  Duke  of  Somerset,  who  had  replaced  Suffolk,  be 
committed  to  the  Tower.*  He  was  satisfied  this  time  by 
thus  proving  his  strength.  But  an  heir  to  the  throne 
being  born  in  1453,  Richard  did  not  conceal  his  designs  ; 
during  a  mental  alienation  of  the  king  he  caused  himself 
to  be  appointed  protector.  The  king,  regaining  his  health, 
deprived  him  of  his  functions.  Then  he  openly  took  arms, 
being  aided  by  the  great  nobles,  and  especially  by  Warwick, 
whose  wealth  and  talent,  and  also  his  inconstancy,  gave  him 
the  title  of  King-maker.  This  famous  captain,  son  of  the 
Earl  of  Salisbury,  belonged  to  the  Nevil  family,  one  of 
the  most  illustrious  houses  of  England.  He  furnished 
daily  support  on  his  lands  to  30,000  persons.  When  he 
occupied  his  London  house  six  oxen  were  provided  at  each 
repast  for  his  vassals  and  friends.  Victor  (1455)  at  St. 
Albans  in  the  county  of  Hertford,  Richard  again  obtained 
from  the  lords  the  title  of  protector.  He  thus  accustomed 
himself  to  place  his  hand  upon  the  government  while  leav- 
ing Henry  VI.  his  crown. 

In  1456  Henry,  having  regained  his  health,  resumed  the 
authority,  and  the  Duke  of  York  appeared  content.  He 
was  only  waiting  for  a  better  opportunity  of  action.  He 
thought  he  had  found  it  in  1460,  and  five  years  after  the 

*  This  tower  has  been  a  fortress,  a  state  prison,  often  a  royal  resi- 
dence, and  is  now  a  government  storehouse.  It  is  a  gloomy,  irregular 
pile,  spreading  over  almost  thirteen  acres.  According  to  tradition  begun 
by  Julius  Caesar,  the  most  ancient  portion  intact  is  at  the  center, 
the  White  Tower,  erected  in  1078.  Few  edifices  have  played  a  larger 
part  in  history  or  have  been  the  scene  of  more  numerous  and  more  atro- 
cious cruelties.  The  last  persons  executed  in  its  walls  were  Lords  Kil- 
marnock,  Balmerino,  and  Lovat,  after  the  rebellion  of  1745.  The  crown 
jewels  and  regalia  of  England  are  now  kept  in  it ;  also  many  headsman's 
axes,  blocks,  and  instruments  of  torture  in  what  might  be  called  a  chamber 
of  horrors,  all  visible  to  morbid  interest  on  the  payment  of  a  small  fee, 
—ED. 


CHAP.  III.]        ENGLAND  FROM  1453    TO   1509.  31 

day  of  St.  Albans  the  second  battle  of  this  war,  that  of 
Northampton,  was  fought.  Before  the  action  the  Yorkists 
had  given  orders  to  spare  the  private  soldiers,  but  to  slay 
all  the  officers.  Richard  was  again  victorious,  and  Parlia- 
ment declared  him  the  legitimate  heir.  They  still  left  to 
Henry  VI.  his  title  of  king. 

In  the  name  of  her  son  Margaret  protested,  took  arms, 
was  aided  by  succor  from  Scotland,  which  she  purchased 
through  the  cession  of  the  stronghold  of  Berwick,  and 
assembled  20,000  men.  Richard  marched  against  her  with 
5000.  This  time  he  was  beaten  and  slain  at  Wakefield  in 
the  county  of  York.  On  the  walls  of  York  Margaret 
exposed  his  head,  which  in  derision  she  adorned  with  a 
paper  crown.  The  youngest  of  his  sons,  the  Count  of  Rut- 
land, scarcely  eighteen  years  old,  was  butchered  in  cold 
blood  after  the  victory.  He  was  fleeing  when  stopped  by 
Lord  Clifford  on  Wakefield  bridge.  Clifford  asked  his 
name.  The  boy,  terrified,  fell  on  his  knees.  His  tutor, 
thinking  thus  to  save  him,  gave  his  name.  "  Thy  father 
slew  mine,"  cried  Clifford  ;  "  I  wish  likewise  to  slay  thee  and 
all  thine."  This  murder,  followed  by  many  others,  pro- 
voked bloody  reprisals.  The  struggle  assumed  an  atro- 
cious character.  Massacre  of  prisoners,  proscription  of  the 
conquered  and  confiscation  of  their  property,  became  the 
rule  on  both  sides.  Always  the  executioner  followed  the 
soldiery. 

Richard  of  York  had  an  avenger  in  his  oldest  son,  whom 
the  people  and  then  the  Parliament  proclaimed  king  at 
London  as  Edward  IV.  First  he  experienced  defeat  at 
the  second  battle  of  St.  Albans,  which  Warwick  lost.  But 
two  months  after  Edward  himself  vanquished  the  Lancas- 
trians at  the  bloody  fight  of  Towton,  southwest  of  York. 
More  than  36,000  men  remained  on  the  field  of  battle,  of 
whom  28,000  wore  the  red  rose.  Margaret  fled  to  Scot- 
land, and  thence  to  France,  where  Louis  XI.  loaned  her 
2000  soldiers,  while  making  her  promise  to  restore  Calais 
to  France.  But  the  battle  of  Hexham  on  Tyne  in  North- 
umberland anew  overthrew  her  hopes  (1463).  She  escaped 
with  her  son  only  after  encountering  a  thousand  dangers, 
and  returned  to  France,  while  Henry  VI.,  a  third  time 
prisoner,  was  shut  up  in  the  Tower  of  London,  where  he 
remained  seven  years. 

The  crown  of  Edward  IV.  was  firmly  set  upon  his  head. 


32     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

But  by  his  marriage  with  Elizabeth  Woodville,  the  daughter 
of  a  private  gentleman,  he  discontented  his  brother,  the  Duke 
of  Clarence,  whom  the  birth  of  a  Prince  of  Wales  quickly 
deprived  of  his  rank  as  heir  presumptive.  The  powerful 
and  haughty  house  of  Nevil  was  provoked  by  the  rapid 
promotion  of  the  relatives  of  Elizabeth  ;  especially  Warwick 
was  incensed,  whom  the  king  had  sent  as  ambassador  to 
France  to  demand  the  hand  of  a  sister-in-law  of  Louis  XI. 
Warwick  and  Clarence  united  their  resentments,  at  first  in 
vain,  and  they  were  obliged  to  take  refuge  in  France.  Queen 
Margaret  and  her  most  redoubtable  adversary  found  them- 
selves together  in  the  same  asylum.  Reconciled  by  mis- 
fortune and  by  the  mediation  of  Louis  XL,  who  delighted  in 
embarrassing  the  ally  of  the  Duke  of  Burgundy,  they  com- 
bined against  their  common  enemy.  Warwick  promised 
to  restore  the  house  of  Lancaster.  Scarcely  had  he  dis- 
embarked in  England  when  his  tenants,  his  former  com- 
panions in  arms,  and  the  partisans  of  the  Red  Rose  flocked 
to  him  in  crowds.  In  a  few  days  he  had  60,000  men.  Ed- 
ward, abandoned  by  his  followers  at  Nottingham  neat- 
Trent  (1470),  fled,  without  having  been  able  to  fight,  to  the 
Netherlands  to  his  brother-in-law,  Charles  of  Burgundy, 
while  Parliament,  docile  to  the  wishes  of  the  stronger  party, 
restored  Henry  VI. 

The  Lancastrian  triumph  was  short.  After  a  few  months 
Edward  reappeared  with  a  small  army  which  Burgundy  had 
helped  him  to  form.  Warwick  succumbed  at  Barnet,  four 
leagues  from  London,  on  account  of  the  defection  of  Clar- 
ence, who  returned  to  his  brother.  The  indomitable  Mar- 
garet, arriving  from  France  with  a  new  army,  was  no  happier 
at  Tewksbury  in  the  county  of  Gloucester  (May,  1471).  This 
last  battle  was  decisive.  The  Prince  of  Wales  being  slaugh- 
tered before  the  eyes  of  the  king,  Henry  dead  or  assassi- 
nated some  days  after  in  his  prison,  Margaret  confined  in 
the  Tower,  the  partisans  of  the  Red  Rose  slain  or  pro- 
scribed, Edward  remained  peaceful  possessor  of  the  throne. 
But  this  security  he  employed  only  to  abandon  himself  to 
pleasure. 

However,  he  issued  a  moment  from  this  voluptuous  repose 
in  1475,  at  ^e  solicitation  of  Charles  the  Bold,  to  commence 
against  Louis  XL  an  expedition  which  was  terminated  by 
the  treaty  of  Pecquigny.  His  last  years  were  darkened  by 
the  trial  of  his  brother  Clarence,  whom  he  caused  to  be  put 


CHAP.  III.]         ENGLAND  FROM  1453    TO   1509.  33 

to  death  (1478).  In  1483,  still  young — only  forty-two  years 
old — he  died,  victim  of  his  debauches. 

Before  expiring  Edward  IV.  entreated  his  family  and  his 
principal  partisans  to  remain  united.  Apparently  he  felt 
presentiment  of  the  tragedies  in  store.  In  fact  his  son, 
Edward  V.,  survived  him  only  three  months. 

For  a  long  time  Richard  of  York,  Duke  of  Gloucester,  a 
monster  of  hypocrisy  and  cruelty,  the  third  brother  of 
Edward  IV.,  had  coveted  the  crown.  He  profited  by  the 
youth  of  his  nephew  to  deprive  him  of  it.  He  commenced 
by  putting  to  death  all  those  who  could  defend  him — Lord 
Rivers,  his  uncle,  Sir  Richard  Gray,  Lord  Hastings — then 
he  called  in  question  the  legitimacy  of  his  birth,  and  caused 
him  finally  to  be  smothered  in  the  Tower  of  London, together 
with  his  younger  brother,  by  the  infamous  Tyrrel.  The 
bodies  of  the  two  unhappy  victims  were  hidden  under  the 
steps  of  the  staircase  of  their  prison,  and  Richard  III.  was 
proclaimed  king. 

This  usurpation  troubled  the  Yorkists,  and  the  Lancas- 
trians took  courage.  Buckingham,  one  of  those  who  had 
done  most  to  place  the  crown  on  the  head  of  Richard,  dis- 
contented, not  by  his  crimes,  but  without  doubt  by  some 
pressing  demand  which  had  been  denied,  rose  against  him 
and  called  the  Welshman  Henry  Tudor,  Count  of  Rich- 
mond, last  scion  on  his  mother's  side  of  the  family  of  Lan- 
caster. Henry  levied  2000  men  in  Brittany  and  landed  in 
Wales.  He  arrived  too  late  to  save  Buckingham,  who  was 
overwhelmed  and  slain,  but  he  conquered  Richard  at 
Bosworth  between  Leicester  and  Coventry.  The  usurper, 
despite  prodigies  of  valor,  perished  in  the  fight  (1485).  This 
was  the  last  of  the  ten  great  battles  of  the  war.  The  Lan- 
castrians had  been  six  times  defeated,  but  the  honor  and 
the  profit  of  the  last  day  remained  to  them. 

Henry  caused  himself  to  be  acknowledged  as  King  of 
England,  and  united  the  two  Roses  by  espousing  Elizabeth, 
daughter  of  Edward  IV.,  the  heiress  of  York.  With  him 
began  the  Tudor  dynasty,  which  reigned  118  years  until 
the  advent  of  the  Stuarts  in  1603. 

But  by  preserving,  despite  this  politic  marriage,  a  marked 
preference  for  the  Lancastrians,  Henry  provoked  the  resent- 
ment of  the  Yorkists.  They  raised  up  against  him  two 
impostors.  One,  Lambert  Simnel,  a  baker's  son,  passed  as 
the  young  Earl  of  Warwick,  son  of  the  Duke  of  Clarence; 


34    REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

the  other,  Perkin  Warbeck,  the  son  of  a  converted  Jew  from 
Tournay,  pretended  to  be  the  Duke  of  York,  the  second 
son  of  Edward  IV.,  whom  Richard  had  smothered  in  the 
Tower.  Henry  VII.  conquered  the  first  at  Stoke  near 
Nottingham  (1487),  and  the  second  at  Towton,  north  of 
Exeter  (1498).  He  pardoned  Simnel,  who  found  employ- 
ment in  the  royal  kitchens,  but  Warbeck  was  confined  in  the 
Tower  of  London.  Having  wished  some  months  after  to 
escape  from  this  prison  with  the  real  Earl  of  Warwick, 
who  was  likewise  detained  there,  he  was  hung  at  Tyburn, 
and  the  king,  to  end  his  fears,  also  beheaded  Warwick. 
State  prisoner  from  his  childhood,  this  unhappy  young 
man  could  be  guilty  only  of  cherishing  regrets  and  hopes. 
But  Ferdinand  the  Catholic  had  consented  to  bestow  his 
daughter,  Catherine  of  Aragon,  upon  the  son  of  Henry  VII. 
only  on  condition  that  the  death  of  Warwick  should  free 
his  future  son-in-law  from  all  disquietude.  With  this 
prince  became  extinct  the  race  of  the  Plantagenets,  who  had 
governed  England  331  years  since  1154. 

Thenceforth  Henry  reigned  without  opposition.  The 
bloody  War  of  the  Roses  had  decimated  and  ruined  the 
English  aristocracy.  Eighty  blood  members  of  the  royal 
family  had  perished  in  it,  and  how  many  of  the  nobility  ! 
If  we  are  to  believe  Sir  John  Fortescue,  a  contemporary, 
under  Edward  IV.  alone  one-fifth  of  the  lands  of  the  king- 
dom by  confiscation  had  been  added  to  the  royal  domain. 
So  the  English  monarchy  on  issuing  from  this  war  no 
longer  encountered  a  powerful  and  haughty  aristocracy, 
the  principal  obstacle  which  had  thus  far  opposed  it. 

In  the  "  History  of  the  Middle  Ages  "  we  have  seen  how 
liberal  the  English  constitution  had  already  become  by  the 
middle  of  the  fifteenth  century.  The  monarchy,  however, 
preserved  an  immense  power.  "  The  person  of  the  king  was 
inviolable.  He  alone  had  the  right  to  convoke  the  states  of 
the  realm,  which  he  could  dissolve  according  to  his  good 
pleasure,  and  whose  legislative  enactments  could  not  be 
legalized  without  his  consent.  He  was  the  chief  of  execu- 
tive administration,  the  only  organ  of  the  nation  in  the 
presence  of  foreign  powers,  commander  of  the  land  and 
sea  forces  of  the  state,  the  fountain  of  justice,  clemency, 
and  honor.  He  possessed  great  powers  for  the  regular- 
ization  of  commerce.  Money  was  coined  in  his  name. 
He  fixed  the  weights  and  measures  and  determined  the 


CHAP.  III.]        ENGLAND  FROM  1453    TO   1509.  35 

places  wherein  markets  and  ports  should  be  established. 
His  ecclesiastical  patronage  was  immense.  His  hereditary 
revenues,  administered  with  economy,  sufficed  to  defray 
the  ordinary  expenses  of  the  government.  His  private 
possessions  were  vast.  He  was,  moreover,  Lord  Suzerain 
of  his  realm,  and  in  this  capacity  possessed  an  infinite 
number  of  lucrative  and  formidable  rights,  which  enabled 
him  to  disquiet  and  crush  those  who  opposed  his  designs 
and  to  enrich  and  promote  without  any  cost  to  himself 
those  who  enjoyed  his  favor."  These  determinate  powers 
gave  him  who  was  clothed  with  them  the  perpetual 
determination  to  go  beyond  them.  The  exhaustion  of  the 
aristocracy  after  the  War  of  the  Two  Roses  furnished  the 
opportunity. 

Edward  IV.  had  not  always  waited  for  the  consent  of 
the  Houses  to  establish  and  raise  taxes.  Henry  VII. 
Henr  vii  went  fartner-  This  covetous  and  timorous 
Tudor^ss-isog)'.  king  was  better  obeyed  than  Edward  III., 
pubHceiiSbeintiesf  the  victor  of  Crecy  ;  better  than  Henry  V., 
the  hero  of  Agincourt.  During  his  reign 
Parliament  was  rarely  convoked  ;  when  it  was  it  showed  no 
independence,  and  accepted  without  a  word  the  propositions 
submitted  to  it  by  the  king.  Forced  loans  disguised  under 
the  name  of  benevolences,  arbitrary  confiscations,  proscrip- 
tions, barbarous  and  unjust  measures  which  the  civil  war 
alone  had  brought  about,  acquired  a  sort  of  legality  through 
the  adhesion  or  the  silence  of  the  Houses.  Parliament 
recognized  the  Star  Chamber,  a  new  tribunal  under  an 
ancient  name,  whose  members  were  entirely  devoted  to  the 
king,  and  which  became  one  of  the  most  docile  instruments 
and  most  redoubtable  weapons  of  absolute  power.  The 
Star  Chamber  in  effect  multiplied  the  cases  which  were 
withdrawn  from  any  connection  with  a  jury,  and  which  put 
at  the  discretion  of  the  agents  of  the  king  the  fortune  and 
the  life  of  all  those  whom  the  king  wished  to  strike. 

The  lords  had  preserved  from  the  Middle  Ages  the  right 
of  having  about  them  an  army  of  servitors  who  aided  them 
to  disturb  the  country  and  defy  justice.  This  was  the 
right  of  maintenance.  Henry  VII.  abolished  it.  More- 
over, he  authorized  the  nobles  to  sell  their  entailed  lands. 
Thereby  he  struck  the  feudal  aristocracy  in  both  present 
and  future.  By  suppressing  maintenances  the  king  took 
away  their  soldiers  from  the  nobles  ;  by  suppressing  entails 


36     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

he  prepared  the  division  of  great  estates — that  is  to  say, 
the  ruin  of  the  great  land  owners — if  custom,  stronger  than 
law,  had  not  continued  to  enforce  the  system  of  entail  which 
still  to-day  exists  in  England. 

Henry  VII.  commenced  the  commercial  and  material 
greatness  of  his  country.  A  treaty  concluded  with  the 
Netherlands  in  1496  established  free  exchange  between  the 
two  countries  ;  another  with  Denmark  opened  the  Baltic 
to  the  English  and  insured  them  the  exclusive  commerce 
of  Iceland.  Following  the  example  of  the  kings  of  the 
Spanish  peninsula,  he  endeavored  to  direct  the  activity  of 
the  English  toward  maritime  discoveries,  and  the  Venetian 
Sebastian  Gabotto  (Cabot)  was  the  first  to  carry  the  Eng- 
lish flag  into  the  island  of  Newfoundland,  and  to  coast 
along  the  Floridas,  where  he  was  speedily  followed  by  the 
merchants  of  Bristol.  Henry  VII.  also  encouraged  national 
industry  by  attracting  to  England  Flemish  workmen  and 
by  forbidding  the  exportation  of  wool.  Finally,  he  ren- 
dered justice  less  inaccessible  to  the  poor,  and  by  marrying 
his  daughter  Margaret  to  the  Scotch  king  James  IV.  pre- 
pared the  reunion  of  the  two  crowns  which  divided  Great 
Britain.  From  this  union  dates  the  right  of  the  Stuarts 
to  the  throne  of  England,  which  they  ascended  in  1603. 
Another  marriage  had  graver  consequences  ;  I  mean  the 
betrothal  of  Catherine  of  Aragon,  daughter  of  Ferdir-and 
the  Catholic,  to  Arthur,  the  elder  son  of  the  king,  and, 
after  the  premature  death  of  this  young  prince,  to  his 
second  son,  who  became  Henry  VIII.  We  shall  see  the 
schism  of  England  from  Rome  issue  from  this  marriage. 
Henry  died  in  1509,  aged  fifty-three  years.  Seized  at  his 
last  moments  with  religious  terror,  he  had  given  money 
necessary  for  the  saying  of  two  thousand  masses. 

As  he  appears  to  us  in  history  this  prince  remains  far 
inferior  to  his  two  celebrated  contemporaries,  Louis  XI.  and 
Ferdinand  the  Catholic.  As  cruel  as  the  first,  as  knavish 
as  the  second,  he  by  no  means  possessed  their  political 
genius.  Sordid  avarice  diminished  or  corrupted  his  most 
sagacious  acts.  Thus  the  law  for  the  abolition  of  mainte- 
nances was  in  his  eyes  less  a  grand  governmental  measure 
than  a  pretext  for  police  exactions  and  fines.  One  day  he 
paid  a  visit  to  the  Earl  of  Oxford  at  his  castle  of  Hen- 
ninghaw.  The  earl  was  one  of  the  most  devoted  partisans 
of  the  Lancastrian  line,  and  one  of  those  who  had  most 


CHAP.  III.]        ENGLAND  FROM  1453    TO   1509.  37 

suffered  for  it.  In  order  to  pay  honor  to  his  sovereign  he 
drew  up  along  the  route  of  Henry  his  servants  and  vassals 
dressed  in  their  finest  clothes.  Their  number  and  the  rich- 
ness of  their  attire  made  the  king  think  that  he  could  well 
strike  a  good  blow  in  this  opulent  house.  "  My  lord," 
said  he  to  the  earl,  "your  generosity  has  been  vaunted 
to  me,  but  I  see  it  is  far  above  what  I  have  heard.  Are  all 
these  people  yours?"  "  Yes,  sire,  and  they  have  come  to 
enjoy  the  pleasure  of  seeing  your  Majesty."  "  I  thank  you 
for  your  good  reception,"  replied  the  king,  "  but  I  cannot 
suffer  violation  of  the  laws  in  my  presence."  A  suit  was 
forthwith  brought  against  the  earl,  and  he  was  quit  only 
by  paying  an  enormous  sum  — 15,000  marks. 

All  things  seemed  good  to  this  sordid  prince  for  filling 
his  treasury.  From  his  subjects  he  extorted  money  to 
make  war  ;  from  foreigners  he  received  it  to  make  peace. 
Thus  he  descended  into  France  in  1492,  and  by  the  treaty 
of  Etaples  sold  to  Louis  XI.  the  retreat  of  the  English  army 
for  745,000  gold  crowns.  He  caused  places  at  court,  even 
those  in  the  Church,  to  be  purchased.  He  gave  bishoprics 
only  for  ready  money,  and  sold  his  pardon  to  the  guilty. 
With  care  he  sought  out  what  persons  died  without  heirs 
and  seized  their  property  by  right  of  escheat,  a  procedure 
which  very  often  took  place  in  presence  of  legitimate  heirs. 
His  favorite  ministers,  Empson,  Dudley,  and  Cardinal  Mor- 
ton, knew  how  to  derive  profit  from  everything,  especially 
from  justice.  An  expedient  of  Morton  to  obtain  money 
from  benevolence  has  become  celebrated.  "  If  thou  spend- 
est  much,"  said  he,  "the  reason  is  thou  art  rich  :  thou  must 
pay  ;  if  thou  spendest  nothing  thou  art  practicing  economy, 
so  keep  on  paying."  This  infernal  dilemma  was  called  the 
fork  and  hook  of  Morton. 

This  reign  inaugurated  for  England  a  despotism  which 
lasted  a  century  and  a  half,  because  on  issuing  from  the 
War  of  the  Roses  the  nation,  worn  out  by  the  barren  and 
bloody  agitations  of  internal  strife,  cast  itself  with  ardor 
into  the  pacific  labors  of  commerce  and  manufacturing. 
Seeing  the  government  of  Henry  VII.  second  this  tendency 
by  the  commercial  treaties  which  it  concluded  and  by  the 
voyages  of  discovery  which  it  undertook,  England  asked  of 
it  nothing  more,  and  for  a  time  forgot  its  Parliament  and  its 
liberties.  The  question  of  the  Reformation  and  the  struggles 
against  Spain  once  more  turned  the  attention  of  the  English 


3&    REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

people  in  another  direction.  But  after  the  bloody  tyranny 
of  Henry  VIII.,  after  the  glorious  tyranny  of  Elizabeth, 
thanks  to  progress  in  national  wealth  and  public  opinion, 
these  recollections  were  to  awake  with  indomitable  energy. 
England  preserves  a  curious  monument  of  the  architec- 
ture of  the  age  in  the  chapel  wherein  Henry  VII.  was 
interred  at  Westminster.  This  is  a  model  of  the  flamboyant 
Gothic,  last  period  of  pointed  architecture. 


CHAPTER  IV. 
SPAIN  FROM  1453  TO  1521. 


State  of   Spain   at   the   Middle   of   the   Fifteenth    Century. — Navarre, 
Aragon,  and  Castile. — Portugal. 


THE  Spanish  people  remained  till  then  almost  entirely 

foreign  to  the  affairs  of  the  other  European  nations.     They 

r  „    .     had  been  obliged  to  conquer  their  soil  step 

State  of  Spam     ,  ..          *   .        ». 

at  the  middle  by  step  from  the  Moors,  and  this  task,  the 
centureyfifteenth  first  condition  of  their  national  existence,  was 
not  even  yet  accomplished.  The  southern 
extremity  of  the  peninsula  belonged  to  the  Mussulmans  and 
formed  the  kingdom  of  Granada,  the  last  of  the  nine  states 
into  which  the  caliphate  of  Cordova  had  been  dismembered. 
Spain  had  therefore  lived  a  life  apart  during  all  the  Middle 
Ages.  She  had,  so  to  speak,  only  a  single  thought,  to  drive 
out  the  Moors,  who  were  even  more  odious  to  her  as  Mus- 
sulmans than  as  foreigners. 

To  this  isolation  she  was  indebted  for  a  remarkable  origi- 
nality. Nowhere  has  religion  exercised  a  larger  influence 
over  the  mind.  There  it  was  half  of  the  fatherland. 

Spain  was  still  in  the  full  Middle  Ages  ;  that  is  to  say, 
anarchy  was  there  at  its  height  under  the  name  of  priv- 
ileges of  class,  province,  city,  and  individual. 

The  kings  had  only  a  shadow  of  power.  In  Castile  the 
nobles  had  just  obliged  the  feeble  John  II.  to  permit  the 
condemnation  and  execution  of  his  favorite,  Alvarez  de 
Luna.  The  formula  which  the  lords  were  wont  to  employ 
at  the  coronation  of  the  kings  of  Aragon  is  well  known  : 
"  We,  who  each  are  worth  as  much  as  you,  and  who  united 
are  more  powerful  than  you,  we  make  you  our  king  and  lord 
on  condition  that  you  preserve  our  fueros  and  immunities  ; 
if  not,  not."  And  these  were  by  no  means  empty  words, 
souvenir  of  departed  days,  but  the  pure  and  simple  expres- 

39 


40    REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.      [BOOK  I. 

sion  of  real  facts.  In  Aragon  there  was  a  magistrate — called 
the  justiza — invested  with  the  highest  jurisdiction,  who  had 
filled  more  than  once  the  role  of  supreme  arbitrator  between 
the  king  and  his  subjects.  This  magistrate,  whose  office 
somewhat  resembled  that  of  the  ephori  in  ancient  Sparta, 
exercised  the  functions  of  supervisor  of  the  prince  and  pro- 
tector of  the  people.  His  person  was  sacred,  his  power 
and  jurisdiction  were  almost  without  bounds.  In  doubtful 
cases  the  kings  themselves  were  obliged  to  consult  him. 
He  received  appeals  from  the  sentences  of  the  royal  judges, 
could  without  appeal  call  up  a  case,  and  had  the  right  of 
examining  royal  proclamations,  of  expelling  the  ministers, 
and  of  forcing  them  to  give  account,  without  himself  having 
any  account  to  render  to  the  states.  Even  as  a  private 
man  he  could  be  arrested  only  by  a  decree  of  the  cortes. 
But  a  tribunal  was  established  to  receive  all  the  complaints 
brought  against  him. 

In  Castile  as  in  Aragon  the  defense  of  public  liberties  was 
confided  especially  to  elected  assemblies,  which  were  called, 
and  are  still  called,  the  cortes.  The  cortes  of  Aragon  were 
composed  of  four  orders:  (i)  the  clergy,  (2)  the  barons,  or 
ricos  hombres,  (3)  the  lower  nobles,  or  infanzones,  (4)  the 
deputies  of  the  cities,  or  procuradores.  The  cortes  of  Ara- 
gon voted  the  taxes,  decided  peace  and  war,  coined  money, 
revised  the  decisions  of  the  tribunals,  watched  over  the 
administration  of  the  country  in  order  to  reform  abuses,  and 
had  every  two  years  a  forty  days'  session  which  the  king 
could  not  dissolve.  The  cortes  of  Castile  comprised  only 
three  orders — the  clergy,  the  nobility,  and  the  deputies  of 
the  cities.  They  voted  subsidies  only  after  having  attended 
to  the  business  of  the  people.  Often,  as  in  case  of  a  royal 
minority,  the  cortes  were  called  to  act  as  the  government  of 
the'country.  In  the  council  of  the  regency,  established  dur- 
ing the  minority  of  John  I.,  it  became  necessary  to  admit 
citizens  equal  in  number,  power,  and  insignia  to  the  noble 
members  of  the  council. 

Besides  the  cortes,  charged  with  defending  general  liber- 
ties against  the  king,  each  province  possessed  special  liber- 
ties or  privileges,  called  fueros.  The  most  famous  were 
those  of  Aragon  and  of  the  Basque  country.  The  Basque 
provinces  possessed  a  real  independence  which  they  have 
preserved  all  through  the  duration  of  modern  times.  The 
Catalans  have  more  than  once  asserted  it  :  in  1462  they 


CHAP.  IV.]  SPAIN  FROM  1453    TO   1521.  41 

deposed  John  II.;  in  1640  they  constituted  themselves  a 
republic. 

As  result  of  all  these  privileges  in  Spain,  there  was  no 
genuine  patriotism,  and  the  spirit  of  locality  was  profoundly 
rooted.  Not  only  the  kingdoms,  but  the  provinces,  and  in 
the  provinces  the  cities,  lived  apart.  Every  noble  was  ready 
to  believe  himself  sole  master  in  his  dominions  ;  and  in 
recollection  of  their  ancient  immunities  the  grandees  of 
Spain  have  preserved  the  privilege  of  remaining  covered  in 
presence  of  their  sovereign.  Finally,  the  three  great  mili- 
tary orders  of  Alcantara,  Calatrava,  and  Compostella,  or  St. 
James,  constituted  by  their  wealth,  their  strongholds,  and 
their  military  organization  three  states,  as  it  were,  in  the 
state. 

But  already  the  turbulence  of  the  feudal  aristocracy,  pri- 
vate wars,  and  the  brigandage  which  was  their  consequence 
had  brought  about  also  the  creation  of  the  St.  Hermandad. 
As  early  as  1260  the  cities  of  Aragon,  and  a  little  later  those 
of  Castile,  had  united  to  assure  the  maintenance  of  public 
peace.  They  had  instituted  tribunals  and  levied  and  orga- 
nized troops  for  repression  of  disorders  committed  upon  the 
highways.  The  establishment  of  the  St.  Hermandad,  or 
sacred  brotherhood,  a  sort  of  civil  guard,  excited  violent 
murmurs  among  the  nobles.  The  archers  of  the  brother- 
hood had  more  than  one  skirmish  to  sustain  against  the 
feudal  bandits.  But  the  institution  withstood  all  the  efforts 
made  to  destroy  it,  withstood  even  the  vices  inherent  in  its 
organization,  and  at  the  siege  of  Granada  rendered  impor- 
tant service. 

Let  us  now  survey  each  of  these  states. 

John  of  Aragon,  an  active  and  able  prince,  but  of  un- 
scrupulous ambition,  had  espoused  the  Queen  of  Navarre, 
by  whom  he  had  one  son,  Don  Carlos,  Prince 
gon,aavnadceaswe:  of  Viana.  The  young  prince  on  the  death 
of  his  mother  was  to  inherit  her  crown.  His 
father  retained  it.  The  partisans  of  the  son  took  arms 
and  were  beaten  at  the  battle  of  Ai'bar  (1452).  The  war, 
twice  suspended,  was  twice  renewed,  and  this  sacreligious 
strife  was  terminated  only  by  the  death  of  the  Prince  of 
Viana,  who  was  probably  poisoned  by  his  father  (1461). 
He  had  two  sisters — one,  Blanche,  the  repudiated  wife  of 
Henry  IV.  of  Castile  ;  the  other,  Leonora,  Countess  of  Foix. 
Don  Carlos  had  bequeathed  his  rights  to  the  former.  She 


42     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

inherited  only  his  misfortunes,  and  died  in  the  castle  of 
Orthez  of  poison  administered  by  her  sister.  A  grand- 
daughter of  Leonora  in  1484  transferred  the  crown  to  the 
French  house  of  Albret,  but  a  second  son  of  John  of  Aragon, 
Ferdinand  the  Catholic,  conquered  Spanish  Navarre  (15 12) 
and  in  1515  declared  it  forever  united  to  his  states.  Lower 
Navarre  north  of  the  Pyrenees  preserved  its  own  kings 
until  the  time  of  Henry  IV. 

This  John  of  Aragon  in  1458  became  King  of  Aragon 
through  the  death  of  Alphonso  V.,  his  brother.  His  reign 
was  troubled  by  continual  rebellions.  The  Catalans,  whose 
privileges  he  violated,  espoused  the  quarrel  of  the  Prince  of 
Viana.  After  the  death  of  the  "  holy  martyr,"  rather  than 
belong  to  John  II.  they  preferred  to  submit  to  the  King  of 
Castile,  who  refused  their  allegiance  but  accepted  the  ces- 
sion of  the  city  of  Estella  in  Navarre  ;  then  to  Don  Pedro 
of  Portugal,  finally  to  the  house  of  Anjou.  The  untimely 
death  of  John  of  Calabria,  son  of  King  Rene",  ruined  their 
hopes.  After  eleven  years  of  war  they  submitted  (1472). 
To  obtain  means  for  resistance  against  this  insurrection 
John  II.  had  pledged  to  France  Cerdagne  and  Roussillon 
in  return  for  a  loan  of  350,000  gold  crowns.  Louis  XI. 
was  not  the  man  to  let  go  what  he  had  once  seized.  John 
II.  in  1473  failed  in  the  attempt  to  recover  Roussillon. 
He  died  in  1479  at  tne  aSe  °f  eighty-two.  His  second 
son,  Ferdinand  the  Catholic,  succeeded  him. 

In  Castile  the  same  spectacle  or  worse  :  Henry  IV.,  who 
in  1454  succeeded  his  father,  John  II.,  rendered  himself  both 
odious  and  contemptible  by  his  predilection  for  Bertrand  de 
Cueva,  a  covetous  and  cowardly  favorite  who  dishonored 
him.  In  1459  the  cortes  demanded  that  the  brother  of  the 
king,  Don  Alphonso,  be  recognized  as  his  heir.  In  1465 
the  nobles  took  arms  and  deposed  the  king  in  effigy.  A 
platform  was  raised  in  the  plain  of'  Avila  ;  thereon  was 
put  the  image  of  Henry  with  scepter  and  crown  covered  by 
black  crape.  Then  a  herald  advanced  and  read  in  a  loud 
voice  a  long  enumeration  of  the  crimes  of  the  monarch. 
At  announcement  of  the  first  crime  the  Archbishop  of 
Toledo  removed  the  crown  ;  at  the  second  the  Count  of 
Plasencia  detached  the  sword  of  justice  ;  at  the  third  the 
Count  of  Beneventum  tore  away  the  scepter.  Finally,  the 
royal  effigy  was  cast  from  the  throne  to  the  ground.  This 
strange  ceremony  was  the  signal  of  civil  war,  the  principal 


CHAP.  IV.]  SPAIN  FROM  1453    TO   1521.  43 

actors  of  the  scene  having  proclaimed  as  king  the  brother 
of  Henry  IV.,  Don  Alphonso,  who  was  only  twelve  years 
old.  But  the  young  king  died  after  the  indecisive  battle  of 
Medina  del  Campo  in  1467,  and  Henry  IV.  consented  to 
recognize  his  sister  Isabella  as  Princess  of  the  Asturias,  or 
heiress,  to  the  detriment  of  his  own  daughter  (1468).  It 
was  one  of  the  conditions  of  peace  that  Isabella  could  not 
marry  without  the  consent  of  the  king.  Many  princes, 
among  them  the  King  of  Portugal,  and  Charles,  Duke  of 
Guyenne,  brother  of  Louis  XI.,  sought  her  hand.  To  them 
Isabella  preferred  Ferdinand,  eldest  son  of  the  King  of 
Aragon,  and  espoused  him  secretly  at  Valladolid  without 
waiting  for  the  consent  of  Henry  IV.  The  contract  of 
marriage  stipulated  that  the  government  of  Castile  should 
belong  to  Isabella  alone. 

This  marriage  rekindled  civil  war.  The  king  no  longer 
disavowing  his  daughter  Jane,  called  Bertraneia,  declared 
her  his  heiress,  but  was  not  able  to  assure  her  her  inherit- 
ance. When  he  died  in  1474  Alphonso  V.,  King  of  Portugal, 
endeavored  to  support  the  cause  of  Jane,  but  was  beaten  at 
Toro  despite  the  aid  of  the  rich  and  powerful  Archbishop 
of  Toledo,  Cavillo  d'Acunha  (1476).  This  prelate,  whose 
turbulent  humor  had  already  troubled  the  reign  of  Henry 
IV.,  had  declared  against  Isabella  through  hatred  of  her 
Aragonese  husband.  He  was  wont  to  say,  "  I  placed  the 
infanta  Isabella  on  the  throne  of  Castile  ;  I  shall  easily  be 
able  to  make  her  descend  from  it.  Though  I  put  a  scepter 
in  her  hand,  I  will  now  compel  her  to  resume  the  distaff." 
He  even  resisted  the  menaces  of  the  Pope,  and  only  in  1478 
became  reconciled  with  his  former prottgfe.  Then  the  King 
of  Portugal  was  obliged  to  yield  ;  Bertraneia  retired  to  a 
nunnery,  and  the  same  year  Ferdinand  the  Catholic  became 
King  of  Aragon  by  the  death  of  John  II.  (1479).  The  two 
crowns  of  Aragon  and  Castile  were  united. 

From  that  day  Spain  existed.  Isabella,  endowed  with 
stable  genius,  and  Ferdinand,  an  exceedingly  able  man, 
though  perfidious  and  disloyal,  which  seemed  in  that  age 
an  additional  excellence,  toiled  with  a  vigor  and  constancy 
that  never  flagged  to  found  national  unity  to  the  profit  of 
the  monarchy.  The  Moors  still  occupied  the  south  of  the 
peninsula.  In  1462  the  loss  of  Gibraltar  closed  Africa 
to  them.  The  troubles  of  Castile  suspended  the  war.  It 
recommenced  in  1482.  Thanks  to  their  intestine  disorders, 


44    REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

they  lost  the  same  year  Alhama,  the  bulwark  of  their 
capital,  Ronda  three  years  after,  Velez,  Malaga,  in  1487, 
Almeria  in  1489  ;  two  years  later  Granada  even  was  be- 
sieged. This  powerful  city  was  flanked  by  more  than  a 
thousand  towers  and  still  contained  200,000  inhabitants. 
The  siege  lasted  nearly  nine  months.  By  accident  one  night 
the  tents  of  Isabella  caught  fire.  The  queen  desired 
the  Spaniards  to  build  a  city  on  the  site  of  the  burned  camp, 
and  thus  to  show  the  Mussulmans  that  the  siege  would 
never  be  raised.  Built  in  eighty  days,  this  city  still  exists 
under  the  name  of  Santa  Fe.  Finally,  pressed  by  famine, 
generally  beaten  in  the  petty  combats  which  constantly  took 
place  under  their  walls,  abandoned  by  Africa,  which  put 
forth  no  effort  to  save  them,  the  Moors  surrendered.  This 
was  the  last  of  the  "  three  thousand  seven  hundred  battles  " 
which  they  had  waged  with  the  Christians.  Gonsalvo  of 
Cordova  drew  up  the  articles  of  capitulation.  These 
stipulated  that  the  Mussulmans  should  be  always  governed 
according  to  their  own  laws,  that  they  should  keep  their 
property  and  customs,  and  enjoy  the  free  exercise  of  their 
faith,  without  being  subjected  to  other  taxes  than  those 
they  paid  their  kings.  When  he  reached  Mount  Padul, 
whence  Granada  is  seen,  Boabdil  (Abdoul  Abdallah),  its 
last  prince,  cast  a  long  look  upon  the  city  while  tears  bathed 
his  face.  "  My  son,"  said  to  him  his  mother,  Aischa,  "  you 
do  well  to  weep  like  a  woman  for  the  throne  which  you 
were  unable  to  defend  like  a  man."  The  domination  of 
the  Arabs  in  Spain  had  lasted  782  years.  It  left  behind  it 
architectural  monuments  of  refined  elegance,  agriculture 
and  manufactures  carried  to  perfection,  picturesque  details 
in  the  customs,  dress,  and  household  furniture,  more  than 
one  sonorous  word  in  the  language,  and  even  in  national 
thought  a  touch  of  delicate  and  flowery  courtesy  of  which 
the  rude  Northern  conquerors  were  utterly  ignorant. 

Spain  was  freed,  but  she  cherished  against  the  infidels  a 
horror  and  a  hatred  ripened,  so  to  speak,  by  eight  centuries 
of  war.  The  population  of  the  peninsula  presented  a 
strange  mixture  of  Moors,  Jews,  and  Christians.  To  make 
the  whole  homogeneous  by  imposing  a  single  faith,  to  fortify 
the  unity  of  the  state  by  the  unity  of  religion,  Ferdinand 
created  a  new  Inquisition.*  This  celebrated  tribunal,  which 

*  The  Inquisition,  although  early  existing  in  the  Western  Church,  was 
made  to  assume  its  peculiar  sanguinary  character  at  the  beginning  of  the 


CHAP.  IV.]  SPAIN  FROM  1453    TO   1521.  45 

has  left  a  terrible  and  an  execrated  name,  at  this  its  second 
appearance  had  a  political  rather  than  ecclesiastical  design. 
Organized  in  Castile  in  1480,  the  Holy  Office  was  established 
four  years  later  in  Aragon,  and  there  maintained  itself 
despite  an  earnest  opposition.  It  was  then  the  only  tri- 
bunal recognized  in  both  countries.  The  king  named  its 
chief  the  Grand  Inquisitor,  and  retained  for  his  treasury 
the  goods  of  the  condemned.  These  were  first  Judaizing 
Christians  and  converted  Moors  who  remained  secretly 
faithful  to  Mohammed  ;  later,  innovators  in  politics  as  well 
as  in  religion.  From  January  to  November,  1481,  the 
inquisitors  sent  298  newly  professed  Christians  to  the  stake 
in  Seville,  and  2000  in  the  provinces  of  Seville  and  Cadiz. 
Placed  under  the  control  of  the  kings,  and  at  times  sus- 
pected by  the  court  of  Rome,  it  was  first  a  means  of  gov- 
ernment and  an  instrument  of  despotism  to  defend  the 
"  two  majesties "  (ambas  majestades),  inasmuch  as  Ferdi- 
nand, who  at  the  capture  of  Granada  had  acquired  for  him- 
self and  his  successors  the  surname  of  Catholic,  so  judi- 
ciously confounded  religion  and  monarchy  that  the  same 
name  served  to  designate  God  and  the  king,  and  thus  rebel- 
lion became  sacrilege.  "  What  still  more  alienated  men's 
minds,"  said  the  Jesuit  Mariana,  "  was  seeing  that  this 
tribunal  inflicted  upon  children  the  punishment  of  their 
parents  ;  that  the  accuser  was  not  known  and  was  not  con- 
fronted with  the  accused  ;  that  the  witnesses  were  not 
known.  Moreover,  nothing  seemed  harder  than  those  secret 
investigations,  which  disturbed  commerce  and  society." 
The  Dominican  Thomas  de  Torquemada  was  the  first 
Grand  Inquisitor.  In  the  eighteen  years  during  which  he 
directed  this  blood  tribunal  8000  persons  were  burned, 
6500  were  burned  in  effigy  or  after  death,  9000  underwent 

thirteenth  century,  when  directed  by  St.  Dominic  and  Pope  Innocent  III. 
against  the  Albigenses.  Entirely  reorganized  in  Spain  in  1480,  it  was 
called  the  Holy  Office,  and  was  shortly  after  introduced  into  Italy. 
Its  introduction  into  the  Netherlands  by  Philip  II.  largely  contributed 
to  their  insurrection.  Napoleon  suppressed  it  in  Spain  in  1808,  and  at 
Rome  in  1809.  After  his  fall  it  revived,  but  only  for  a  brief  time.  The 
execution  of  heretics  by  burning  at  the  stake  was  sacreligiously  called 
attto-da-fd  (act  of  faith),  the  last  in  America  taking  place  in  Mexico  in 
1815,  and  in  Spain  in  1826.  The  Catholic  historian  Llorente  states  that 
in  Spain  alone  before  1809  it  burned  alive  at  the  stake  31,912  persons, 
1 7>659  persons  in  effigy,  and  condemned  to  imprisonment  or  various  tor- 
tures 291, 450  more. — ED. 


46    REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

the  punishment  of  branding,  of  confiscation  of  goods,  or  of 
perpetual  imprisonment. 

In  1492  the  Inquisition  was  sufficiently  strong  to  obtain 
the  banishment  of  the  Jews  after  having  despoiled  them  of 
their  goods.  They  were  forbidden  to  carry  away  either  gold 
or  silver,  but  only  articles  of  merchandise.  Contemporary 
writers  estimate  at  800,000  the  number  of  those  who  left 
Spain.  The  larger  number  of  these  perished  or  were  made  to 
endure  atrocious  sufferings.  Thus  fanaticism  immolated 
an  entire  people,  who  had  long  been  the  principal,  the  only, 
representatives  of  arts,  manufactures,  and  science.  A  decree 
deprived  the  Moors  of  the  religious  liberty  which  the  treaty 
of  Granada  had  left  them,  and  thus  many  went  into  exile. 
Their  definite  expulsion  was  not  pronounced  till  a  century 
later  (1609).  So  Spain  gained  its  religious  unity,  but  she 
lost  her  arts,  manufactures,  and  commerce,  of  which  the 
Jews  and  the  Moors  were  the  most  active  agents. 

Through  the  Inquisition  the  king  controlled  consciences  ; 
through  the  right  conferred  on  him  by  the  Pope  of  appoint- 
ing to  all  the  Church  livings  he  gained  a  great  ascendancy 
over  the  clergy  ;  by  having  himself  elected  grand  master 
of  the  orders  of  Calatrava,  Alcantara,  and  St.  James  he 
acquired  military  power  and  considerable  revenues.  This 
last  order — the  most  important  of  them  all,  it  is  true — could 
equip  1000  lancers.  The  reunion  of  these  dignities  to  the 
crown  was  at  first  only  personal,  but  Ferdinand  caused  the 
Pope  to  declare  it  perpetual.  Through  the  reorganization 
of  the  St.  Hermandad,  of  which  he  declared  himself  the 
protector,  and  which  he  subordinated  to  the  council  of  Cas- 
tile, the  monarchy  acquired  the  means  of  controlling  the 
national  police,  and  under  pretext  of  punishing  or  repressing 
private  wars  among  the  barons,  it  razed  their  castles.  In 
1481  forty-six  castles  were  demolished  in  the  province  of 
Galicia  alone  and  the  highest  heads  fell.  Commissioners 
were  sent  into  all  the  provinces  to  listen  to  the  complaints 
of  the  people  against  the  grandees  and  to  supervise  the 
judges,  who  in  case  of  betrayal  of  trust  were  to  restore 
sevenfold.  Finally,  by  the  famous  bulk  de  la  cruzada  the 
king  obtained  a  considerable  share  in  the  sale  of  indul- 
gences. 

United  within,  Spain  abroad  assumed  an  importance  she 
had  never  possessed.  For  the  crown  of  Castile  Columbus 
discovered  the  new  world.  Ximenes  gave  it  Oran  on  the 


CHAP.  IV.]  SPAIN  FROM  1453    TO   1521.  47 

coast  of  Africa  (1509),  and  Pedro  de  Vera  the  Canaries, 
whose  native  population,  the  Guanches,  was  exterminated. 
A  stopping  place,  important  for  the  navigation  of  the  Atlan- 
tic, was  thus  acquired  for  Spain.  For  the  crown  of  Aragon 
Ferdinand  conquered  the  kingdom  of  Naples  (1504),  and 
took  away  Navarre  from  Jean  d'Albret  (1512),  thereby 
closing  to  the  advantage  of  Spain  one  of  the  two  gates  of 
the  Pyrenees.  He  already  held  the  other  through  Rous- 
sillen,  which  Charles  VIII.  had  restored  to  him  in  1493. 

The  death  of  Isabella  came  near  separating  the  two 
kingdoms.  The  queen  left  only  a  daughter,  Jane  the 
Foolish,  married  to  the  archduke  Philip  the  Fair,  son  of 
Mary  of  Burgundy  and  of  Maximilian  of  Austria,  conse- 
quently already  sovereign  of  the  Netherlands.  Discontented 
with  her  son-in-law,  the  queen  by  will  bequeathed  the 
regency  of  Castile  to  her  husband.  The  Castilians  reluc- 
tantly submitted  to  the  last  wishes  of  their  great  sovereign, 
and  Philip  needed  only  to  disembark  in  Spain  to  seize  the 
power.  But  he  died  soon  afterward,  and  Ferdinand,  thanks 
to  the  support  of  the  famous  Cardinal  Ximenes,  Archbishop 
of  Toledo,  was  recognized  by  the  cortes  Regent  of  Castile 
during  the  minority  of  his  grandson  Charles,  son  of  Philip 
the  Fair. 

However,  the  unity  of  Spain  was  not  yet  made  sure. 
Ferdinand  through  dislike  of  Philip  the  Fair  had  contracted 
a  second  marriage  with  Germaine  de  Foix,  niece  of  Louis 
XII.,  in  whose  favor  the  French  king  renounced  his  claim 
to  Naples.  This  union  was  childless.  A  project  of  be- 
queathing Aragon  to  his  second  grandson  at  the  expense 
of  the  first,  whom  he  did  not  love,  came  to  nothing.  Ferdi- 
nand, inspired  on  the  bed  of  death  (1516)  with  the  grand 
thought  of  the  unity  of  Spain,  bequeathed  all  his  crowns  to 
Charles,  who  had  already  gathered  the  heritage  of  Isabella, 
and  who  was  still  to  gather  that  of  his  grandfather,  the 
emperor  Maximilian.  Philip  II.  was  right  in  saying  when 
speaking  of  King  Ferdinand,  "  To  him  we  owe  all." 

Ximenes,  Archbishop  of  Toledo  and  Grand  Inquisitor,  was 
Regent  of  Castile  until  the  arrival  of  the  young  king,  then 
in  Flanders.  An  austere  man,  with  a  mind  of  rare  vigor, 
he  had  anticipated  the  Reformation  by  making  it  himself  ; 
at  least  he  had  brought  back  many  monastic  Spanish  orders 
to  rigid  discipline  ;  to  reanimate  the  religious  spirit  in  the 
country,  he  had  conducted  at  his  own  expense  a  crusade 


48    REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [ BOOK  I. 

into  Africa  under  the  walls  of  Oran,  of  which  he  made 
himself  master.  On  the  death  of  Isabella  he  adminstered 
Castile,  and  kept  it  quiet  after  the  death  of  Ferdinand. 
Stern  to  others  as  to  himself,  he  remained  a  monk  under 
the  Roman  purple  and  in  the  palace  of  kings  ;  but  he  no 
more  tolerated  resistance  to  the  faith  than  to  the  prince. 
He  burned  the  heretics  and  curbed  the  lords.  One  day 
the  grandees  asked  him  what  were  his  credentials.  "  There 
they  are,"  he  replied,  pointing  to  formidable  artillery  and  to 
a  body  of  troops  drawn  up  under  the  windows  of  the  palace. 

Charles,  who  in  Spain  was  Charles  I.  and  in  the  empire 
Charles  V.,  at  first  committed  only  errors.  He  disgraced 
Ximenes  and  surrounded  himself  with  Flemish  favorites. 
When  in  1519  Spain  learned  that  he  had  obtained  the  im- 
perial crown  and  that  he  had  accepted  it,  she  feared,  with 
reason,  that  she  was  to  see  her  blood  and  money  sacrificed 
to  the  ambition  of  the  new  emperor.  Charles  despised 
these  murmurs  and  embarked  for  Germany,  but  his  de- 
parture was  the  signal  for  an  insurrection  which  spread 
from  Toledo  all  through  Castile.  The  insurrected  cities 
united  in  a  confederation  which  took  the  name  of  the  Holy 
League  (Junta  Santa),  and  refused  to  lay  down  arms  until 
the  emperor  had  abolished  the  pecuniary  privileges  of  the 
nobility.  The  aristocracy  then  separated  its  cause  from 
that  of  the  citizens  and  rallied  around  the  sovereign.  The 
army  of  the  league  was  beaten  at  Villalar,  and  its  chief, 
the  noble  Don  Juan  de  Padilla,  died  upon  the  scaffold  (1521). 

Charles  V.  then  completed  the  work  of  Ferdinand  and 
Isabella.  He  compelled  the  Moors  of  the  province  of 
Valencia  to  be  baptized,  and  all  those  of  Granada  to  re- 
nounce their  costume  and  language.  He  cited  before  the 
tribunal  of  the  Holy  Office  the  bishops  who  had  declared 
for  the  communeros.  The  clergy  was  obliged  to  bow  the 
head  beneath  the  weapon  which  it  itself  had  furnished. 
Many  others  bowed  it  ;  the  privileges  of  the  cities  were 
abolished,  and  Charles  deprived  the  cortes  of  their  impor- 
tance by  compelling  them  to  vote  the  taxes  before  the  con- 
sideration of  complaints,  and  by  forbidding  the  deputies 
any  preliminary  reunion.  The  nobles  refusing  to  pay  their 
share  of  the  state  expenses,  he  ceased  to  summon  them  to 
the  cortes.  They  appeared  no  longer  in  the  armies,  now 
composed  of  mercenaries,  nor  at  the  court,  crowded  with 
Flemings. 


CHAP.  IV.]  SPAIN  FROM  1453    TO  1521.  49 

So  the  king  triumphed  both  over  the  citizens  and  over  the 
nobles  —  an  injurious  victory,  which  was  one  of  the  principal 
causes  of  the  decline  of  Spain.  Thenceforward  the  activity 
of  this  great  nation  was  repressed  by  a  despotism  which 
knew  not,  like  that  on  the  other  side  of  the  Pyrenees,  how 
to  give  glory  in  exchange  and  to  prepare  the  way  for  civil 
equality. 

At  the   southwest  extremity  of   the   peninsula   the  tiny 

kingdom  of    Portugal  was   then  casting   a  brilliant  light. 

_    .      .        The  Capetian  house  of  Burgundy,  which  had 

Portugal.  ....  ,        J 

founded  this  kingdom,  was  then  perpetuated 
only  by  an  illegitimate  branch,  that  of  Avis,  which  reigned 
since  the  glorious  day  of  Aljubarota,  when  John  I.  the 
Bastard  had  beaten  his  competitor,  the  King  of  Castile 


The  new  dynasty,  offspring  of  popular  reaction  and  na- 
tional sentiment,  at  first  respected  public  liberty.  John  I. 
had  convoked  the  cortes  twenty-five  times.  The  minor- 
ity of  Alphonso  V.,  surnamed  the  African  (1438-81),  was 
favorable  to  the  grandees  ;  a  civil  war  broke  out,  then 
followed  useless  but  glorious  expeditions  into  Africa,  with 
the  capture  of  Arzila  and  Tangiers,  and  an  unfortunate 
intervention  in  Spain,  where  Alphonso  sustained  the  rights 
of  Jane  of  Castile,  daughter  of  Henry  IV.  Conquered  at 
Toro  (1476),  he  was  forced  to  solicit  the  assistance  of 
France.  Louis  XI.  did  not  greatly  love  adventurous  expe- 
ditions ;  he  gave  him  nothing,  but  he  hindered  him  from 
shutting  himself  up  in  a  monastery,  preferring  to  see  at 
Lisbon  a  prince  friendly  to  France,  hostile  to  Castile  and 
Aragon,  rather  than  to  count  one  monk  more,  though  a 
king,  in  his  abbeys. 

John  II.  (1481-95),  the  successor  of  Alphonso  V.,  was 
the  Louis  XI.  of  Portugal,  and  a  Louis  XL  still  more 
energetic  than  he  of  France.  At  the  very  commencement 
of  his  reign  he  revoked  in  the  cortes  of  Evora  all  the 
concessions  made  to  the  nobility  to  the  detriment  of  the 
royal  domain  ;  he  took  away  from  the  lords  the  right  of 
life  and  death  over  their  vassals,  and  subjected  them  them- 
selves to  the  jurisdiction  of  the  crown  officers  (1482). 
This  reform  excited  a  revolt  ;  the  Duke  of  Braganza  put 
himself  at  the  head  of  the  malcontents.  John  II.  had  him 
seized  and  beheaded  (1483). 

The  nobles  then  betook  themselves  to  attempts  at  assas- 


5°    REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK.  1. 

sination.  The  king  with  his  own  hand  stabbed  their 
chief,  his  cousin,  the  Duke  of  Viseu.  Appalled  at  such 
examples,  the  nobility  bowed  its  head.  The  independence 
of  the  national  assemblies  was  likewise  broken  ;  the  cortes 
reappeared  only  three  times  in  fourteen  years.  Then  the 
royal  despotism  found  itself  solidly  established  ;  in  return 
it  gave  a  powerful  impulse  to  commerce  and  the  spirit  of 
adventure,  and  the  Renaissance  was  encouraged.  Lisbon, 
declared  a  free  port,  received  the  Jews  driven  from  Spain  ; 
the  islands  of  Cape  Verd  were  discovered  ;  the  Cape  c£ 
Good  Hope  was  passed  and  the  nation  launched  itself  into 
that  adventurous  career  wherein,  following  the  footsteps  of 
Vasco  da  Gama  and  Albuquerque,  it  was  destined  to  attain 
a  grandeur  ephemeral,  but  for  a  moment  dazzling. 

Emanuel  the  Fortunate  harvested  what  John  II.  had 
sown.  During  the  course  of  his  reign,  as  tranquil  at  home 
as  it  was  glorious  abroad,  discoveries  succeeded  each  other 
with  marvelous  rapidity,  and  in  the  midst  of  the  riches  of 
India  Portugal  forgot  its  ancient  spirit  of  independence. 
Emanuel  let  the  cortes  fall  into  disuse  ;  during  the  last 
twenty  years  of  his  reign  he  did  not  convoke  them  once. 

So  the  momentous  fact  which  we  have  already  recognized 
in  France,  Aragon,  and  Castile  was  reproduced  in  Portugal  : 
the  monarchy  became  preponderant.  "  John  taught  all 
human  kings  the  art  of  reigning,"  said  Camoens.  When, 
learning  of  his  end,  the  great  Isabella  cried,  "  The  man  is 
dead,"  everybody  understood  that  he  who  had  just  passed 
away  was  the  energetic  King  of  Portugal. 


CHAPTER   V. 
GERMANY   AND    ITALY   FROM    1453   TO    1494. 


Divisions  of  Germany  and  Italy. — The  Emperors  Frederick  III.  and 
Maximilian. — Italy  in  the  Second  Part  of  the  Fifteenth  Century. 


WE    have    just    seen    vast    monarchies    and    powerful 

royalties   formed    in    France,    England,  and    Spain.     The 

three   great   nations   of  the   West,  reunited 

German^nSand    each  under  a  national  chief  who  introduced 

perors  ^rederl    order  and  obedience   in   the  interior,   were 

ick     in.    and    therefore  ready  for  action  abroad,  and  in  fact 

were  going  to  act  beyond  their  frontiers. 

At  the  center  of  the  European  continent  two  nations,  on 
the  contrary,  persisted  in  continuing  to  live  the  life  of 
anarchy  as  in  the  Middle  Ages.  Divided,  consequently 
feeble,  Germany  and  Italy  were  to  tempt  the  ambition  of 
every  conqueror,  and  so  one  after  the  other  to  behold  the 
armies  of  Europe  march  upon  their  soil  to  decide  their 
quarrels.  Italy  became  the  first  European  battlefield  ; 
when  victory  had  given  it  to  one  of  the  assailants,  Ger- 
many took  her  turn.  By  the  woes  of  repeated  invasions 
these  two  countries  had  to  pay  for  the  ambition  and  pride 
of  their  cities  and  princes. 

In  Germany  the  house  of  Austria  had  just  re-seized  the 
imperial  scepter,  no  more  to  lose  it.  But  the  indolent 
Frederick  III.  was  incapable  of  attaching  real  power  to  the 
title  of  emperor.  During  a  reign  of  fifty-three  years 
(1440-93)  he  forgot  the  empire  and  was  busied  only  in 
aggrandizing  his  Austrian  domains,  which  he  raised  to  an 
archduchy  in  1453.  The  electors  vainly  menaced  him 
with  deposition  ;  he  did  not  abandon  his  systematic  in- 
difference. He  permitted  the  Duke  of  Burgundy,  Philip 
the  Good,  to  break  the  feudal  bond  which  attached  the 


52     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.      [BOOK  I. 

Netherlands  to  the  empire  ;  and  if  he  disappointed  the 
ambition  of  the  Bold  by  refusing  him  the  title  of  king,  he 
made  few  efforts  to  save  Neuss  and  the  Swiss,  who  rescued 
themselves  all  alone,  the  first  by  obstinate  resistance,  the 
second  by  three  victories.  In  1460  a  civil  war  broke  out 
in  Germany  itself.  Frederick  was  satisfied  with  putting 
its  author,  the  Elector  Palatine,  under  the  ban  of  the  empire  ; 
the  elector  replied  to  this  impotent  sentence  by  adding  to 
his  castle  at  Heidelberg  a  tower  which  he  called  Trutz- 
Kaiser  (Plague  on  the  Emperor),  and  which  merited  its  name. 
Another  bad  civil  war  continued  from  1449  to  1456  between 
many  princes  and  seventy-two  cities.  More  than  two  hun- 
dred villages  were  burned  on  one  side  or  the  other.  Freder- 
ick remained  simple  spectator  of  the  struggle,  in  which  the 
Swiss,  however,  had  taken  part. 

In  his  own  dominions  Frederick  when  he  drew  the  sword 
was  less  indolent  without  being  more  successful.  His 
predecessor,  Albert  of  Austria,  had  left  to  his  son,  Ladislaus 
the  Posthumous,  the  crowns  of  Bohemia  and  Hungary,  to- 
gether with  the  duchy  of  Austria.  Frederick  detained  the 
young  king,  and  when  the  energetic  demands  of  the 
Bohemians  and  Hungarians  obliged  him  to  let  him  go  free 
he,  however,  kept  the  crown  of  St.  Stephen,  to  which  in  the 
eyes  of  the  Hungarians  seemed  attached  the  independence 
of  their  country.  Mohammed  II.  entered  Constantinople, 
and  in  1456  he  conducted  his  victorious  troops  before  Bel- 
grade, the  last  bulwark  of  Christianity.  There  was  then  a 
glorious  role  to  play  ;  Frederick  left  it  to  John  Huniadi, 
"the  White  Knight  of  Walachia."  A  Franciscan,  Giovanni 
Capistrano,  led  to  the  Hungarian  hero  46,000  Germans 
whom  his  preaching  had  inspired.  Huniadi  penetrated 
into  the  city,  caused  the  siege  to  be  raised,  but  died  of  his 
wounds,  bequeathing  to  his  son,  MathiasCorvinus,  his  glory 
and  his  popularity. 

Two  years  after  Ladislaus  died.  Frederick  claimed  to 
be  his  heir.  Every  where  he  failed.  The  Bohemians  elected 
as  king  Podiebrad,  the  Hungarians  MathiasCorvinus,  and 
Frederick  was  obliged  to  share  the  archduchy  of  Austria 
with  his  cousin  Sigismund  and  his  brother  Albert.  He  en- 
deavored to  take  their  part  by  force,  was  beaten,  and  would 
have  been  captured  at  Vienna  had  it  not  been  for  the  assist- 
ance brought  him  by  Podiebrad.  The  death  of  Albert  gave 
him  naturally  what  he  coveted,  but  after  that  of  Podiebrad  in 


CHAP.  V.]  GERMANY  AND  ITALY  FROM  1453   TO  1494.     53 

1471  Bohemia  escaped  him  still  ;  Vladislaus,  the  oldest  son 
of  Casimir  IV.,  King  of  Poland,  was  elected.  Frederick 
hoped  that  at  least  a  long  rivalry  was  going  to  exhaust 
Bohemia  and  Hungary,  where  Mathias,  aided  by  the  Vene- 
tians and  Scanderbeg,  sustained  gloriously  the  contest 
against  the  Ottomans.  But  the  two  kings  agreed  ;  Mathias 
found  himself  free  to  call  the  emperor  to  account  for  his 
intrigues,  for  his  underhand  dealing  in  Hungary,  and  for 
his  cowardly  abandonment  of  the  cause  of  Christianity  and 
civilization.  The  Austrian  troops  were  beaten  ;  Vienna 
was  captured  in  1485,  and  remained  in  the  hands  of  Mathias 
until  his  death  in  1490. 

Yet  this  emperor  "  of  very  little  heart,"  as  says  Comines, 
this  archduke  always  defeated,  founded  the  greatness  of 
his  dynasty.  The  marriage  of  his  son  Maximilian  with 
Mary  of  Burgundy  gave  the  Netherlands,  and  later  still 
Spain,  to  Austria.  We  have  already  seen  how  this  marriage 
was  brought  about,  and  what  were  the  relations  of  Fred- 
erick III.  with  Charles  the  Bold. 

Maximilian  was  educated,  eloquent,  and  brave.  He 
loved  letters,  arts,  and  sciences,  and  cultivated  them  with 
success  ;  but  his  character  was  light  and  fickle.  He  never 
lingered  long  upon  the  same  matter  or  in  the  same  place, 
always  upon  the  highways  of  Europe  and  engaged  in  every 
adventure,  making,  in  a  word,  much  noise  and  accomplishing 
little.  He  occupied  himself,  however,  somewhat  more  with 
Germany  than  did  his  father.  The  anarchy  had  become 
such  that  certain  states  had  taken  the  initiative  of  the  most 
energetic  measures.  In  1488  the  Swabian  cities  and  princes 
formed  a  league  at  Esslingen  ;  the  extent  of  the  disorder 
can  be  judged  by  this  fact,  that  in  a  few  years  the  con- 
federation had  razed  no  less  than  144  fortresses  whose 
masters  were  from  time  immemorial  in  the  habit  of  plunder- 
ing travelers  and  of  pillaging  the  country.  But  a  partial 
and  temporary  effort  was  not  enough  ;  a  system  of  general 
and  permanent  repression  was  necessary  if  public  peace 
was  to  be  established. 

This  was  the  end  sought  by  the  diet  of  Worms  when 
promulgating  the  famous  constitution  of  1495,  which  for- 
bade under  penalty  of  fine  and  forfeiture  all  war  between 
the  states.  In  order  to  punish  violations  of  this  funda- 
mental law,  or  to  prevent  them,  a  permanent  tribunal  was 
instituted  whose  members  were  chosen  by  the  emperor  from 


54     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.      [BOOK  I. 

a  list  of  candidates  presented  by  the  states.  This  tribunal 
took  the  name  of  the  Imperial  Chamber. 

It  remained  now  to  put  in  execution  the  decrees  of  this 
supreme  court.  For  this  they  provided  by  the  division  of 
Germany  into  ten  districts — a  wise  project,  which  the 
emperor  Albert  II.  had  already  tried,  and  which  was  realized 
during  the  reign  of  Maximilian  by  the  diets  of  Augsburg 
(1500)  and  of  Treves  (1512).  All  the  German  territory, 
all  Bohemia  and  its  dependencies,  were  divided  into  ten 
departments,  which  had  each  its  director.  Each  district 
maintained  at  its  expense  a  body  of  troops  which  were 
placed  under  the  command  of  the  prince  director  and 
charged  with  the  maintenance  of  public  peace.  The  posts, 
instituted  by  Maximilian  after  the  example  of  those  which 
Louis  XI.  had  organized  in  France,  were  also  a  bond 
between  the  different  parts  of  the  territory. 

Unhappily  for  Germany  these  institutions  of  public 
police  only  half  succeeded.  The  diet,  which  alone  exer- 
cised legislative  power,  distrusted  the  Austrian  emperors  ; 
they  on  the  other  hand  hindered  the  putting  in  operation 
of  rules  and  laws  established  by  the  sovereign  assembly. 
Thus  the  Aulic  Council,  created  in  1501  by  Maximilian  for 
the  administration  of  his  hereditary  estates  and  for  the 
decision  of  cases  reserved  for  the  emperor,  diminished  the 
authority  of  the  Imperial  Chamber.  Limited  at  first  to  the 
Austrian  estates,  the  jurisdiction  of  the  new  tribunal,  while 
dependent  upon  the  court  of  Vienna,  extended  little  by 
little  beyond  its  bounds  and  made  a  powerful  competition 
with  the  Imperial  Chamber,  whose  members  were  badly 
paid  and  their  decisions  badly  obeyed.  The  encroach- 
ments of  the  Aulic  Council  were  to  be  one  of  the  causes  of 
the  Thirty  Years  War. 

Upon  the  whole,  at  the  end  of  this  period  the  Holy  Ger- 
man Empire,  by  whatsoever  title  the  pride  of  its  chief  was 
flattered,  was  in  reality  an  agglomeration,  without  stability, 
of  princes  and  cities  who  had  hardly  other  bonds  than 
ancient  recollections,  similarity  of  customs,  and  identity  of 
language — bonds  that  were  to  prove  themselves  exceed- 
ingly fragile  on  the  day  when  thundered  the  storm  of 
religious  passion. 

Even  already  the  most  powerful  of  the  German  princes 
were  uneasy  at  this  activity  of  Maximilian.  Upon  their 
lands  they  had  seized  the  absolute  power  just  as  the  kings 


CHAP.  V.]  GERMANY  AND  ITALY  FROM  1453   TO  1494.     55 

had  done  in  their  kingdoms.  "  They  do  everything  that 
they  please,"  said  an  almost  contemporary  writer.  The 
revolution  remarked  in  France,  England,  and  Spain  had 
then  also  taken  place  in  the  empire,  but  to  the  profit  of  the 
princes,  not  to  that  of  the  emperor.  In  1502  the  seven 
electors  concluded  the  electoral  union,  through  which  they 
bound  themselves  to  meet  annually  in  order  to  provide 
means  for  maintaining  their  independence  and  for  arresting 
the  encroachments  of  imperial  authority.  Their  fears  were 
groundless;  two  things  were  lacking  to  give  Maximilian  suc- 
cess, money  and  perseverance.  Ail  his  life  he  rushed  from 
one  project  to  another,  and  all  his  life  he  was,  as  the  Italians 
called  him,  Massimiliano  pochi  danari  (Max  the  Penniless). 
The  political  history  of  the  empire  is  as  empty  under 
Maximilian  I.  as  under  Frederick  III.  And  it  is  less  as 
emperor  that  he  takes  part  in  the  chief  affairs  of  Europe 
than  as  father  of  the  ruler  of  the  Netherlands  or  as  Arch- 
duke of  Austria.  It  is  under  this  title  that  he  signs  with 
Charles  VIII.  the  treaty  of  Senlis,  which  brings  him  Artois 
and  Franche  Comte  (1493),  that  he  carries  on  a  disastrous 
war  against  the  Swiss  and  concludes  with  them  the  peace 
of  Basel  (1499),  tnat  h'e  joins  the  league  against 
Charles  VIII.,  later  that  of  Cambrai  against  Venice  (1508), 
that  later  still  he  joins  the  coalition  against  Louis  XII., 
and  that  he  gains  the  battle  of  Guinegate  (1513).  A  quar- 
rel arising  as  to  the  Bavarian  succession,  in  which  he 
interfered,  brought  him  many  cities  and  much  territory 
upon  the  Inn  ;  the  death  of  a  count  of  Goritz  and  Gra- 
disca  endowed  him  with  those  two  territories  ;  finally, 
that  of  the  archduke  Sigismund  of  the  Tyrolese  branch 
reunited  in  his  hands  all  the  possessions  of  Austria.  His 
life  was  sufficiently  prolonged  to  see  the  immense  exten- 
sion given  to  the  power  of  his  house  by  the  marriage  of 
Philip  the  Fair  with  Joanna  the  Foolish,  heiress  of  Spain, 
Naples,  and  the  New  World  ;  and  he  prepared  the  marriage 
of  his  grandson  Ferdinand  with  the  sister  of  Louis  II., 
which  assured  him  the  succession  to  the  crowns  of  Hun- 
gary and  Bohemia.  But  he  saw  also  the  beginning  of  what 
was  one  of  the  principal  obstacles  to  this  power,  the  Refor- 
mation. He  died  in  1519,  and  Luther  at  that  date  had 
already  broken  with  Rome.  It  is  reported  that  to  familiar- 
ize himself  with  death  Maximilian  carried  his  coffin  with 
him  during  the  last  year  of  his  life. 


56    REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  ]. 

At  the  moment  of  the  invasion  of  the  French,  Italy 
was  the  center  of  all  the  Mediterranean  commerce.  There 
was  then  in  Europe  no  country  where  agri- 
second  haif^f  culture  was  so  wisely  conducted,  where  busi- 
the  fifteenth  ness  was  so  active.  "  The  manufactures  of 
silk,  wool,  flax,  skins,  the  quarrying  of  Car- 
rara marble,  the  foundries  of  Maremma,  the  manufacture 
of  alum,  sulphur,  and  bitumen,  were  still  in  full  activity. 
The  system  of  cultivation  by  petty  farmers,  so  superior  at 
this  epoch  to  whatever  was  carried  on  in  the  rest  of  Europe, 
assured  Italy  a  fertility  augmented  in  Lombardy  by  the 
hydraulic  labors  of  Ludovico  il  Moro,  in  Tuscany  by  pre- 
cautions taken  against  inundations  and  stagnant  waters, 
which  even  to-day  render  desolate  countries  formerly 
fertile.  The  villages,  where  the  peasants  intrenched 
themselves  behind  ramparts,  bore  witness  to  a  comfort 
which  corresponded  to  the  splendor  of  the  great  cities  ; 
and  in  them  there  were  so  many  charms  in  the  relations 
of  life,  so  much  courtesy  and  a  courtesy  so  exquisite,  so 
much  intelligence,  in  a  word,  of  that  which  renders  life 
sweet  and  easy,  that  the  Italian,  the  richest,  the  happiest, 
the  most  civilized  of  European  nations,  could  treat  other 
nations  as  barbarians  who  were  always  ready  to  admire  its 
splendid  cities  and  to  sit  in  its  learned  schools"  (Zeller). 

Despite  all  that,  Italy  was  the  most  feeble  of  European 
nations.  She  had  artists  and  merchants,  but  not  a  people. 
She  had  condottieri,  but  no  soldiers.  The  Italians,  so  skillful 
in  conspiracy,  no  longer  knew  how  to  fight :  at  the  battle  of 
Anghiari  they  contended  four  hours  and  nobody  was  killed 
save  a  horseman  suffocated  in  the  crowd.  Such  were  the 
bitter  fruits  of  despotism  ;  as  there  no  longer  existed  liberty 
or  fatherland  there  no  longer  existed  citizens  or  courage. 

More  divided  than  Germany,  Italy  had  not  even  a  name 
which  was  accepted  by  all,  as  that  of  the  emperor,  nor  au- 
thority which  was  at  least  sometimes  respected,  as  that  of  the 
diet.  Her  different  states,  completely  independent,  had  no 
other  bond  among  them  than  similarity  of  language  and 
customs. 

In  the  middle  of  the  fifteenth  century  a  new  situation 
was  beginning  for  the  peninsula.  It  was  no  longer  Guelph 
or  Ghibelline,  pontifical  or  imperial ;  above  all,  it  was  no 
longer  republican,  but  princely.  A  condottiere,  Sforza,  had 
founded  a  ducal  line  at  Milan,  and  many  others  had  equally 


CHAP.  V.]  GERMANY  AND  ITALY  FROM  1453   TO  1494.     57 

good  fortune  in  Romagna  and  Emilia.  A  family  of  bankers, 
the  Medici,  ruled  at  Florence,  the  King  of  Aragon  at 
Naples.  It  was  important  to  know  if  these  princes  were 
going  at  least  to  act  in  concert  to  defend  against  the 
foreigner  the  independence  of  Italy  which  they  had  sub- 
jected. Without  speaking  of  the  pretensions  and  the  cupid- 
ities which  menaced  from  the  side  of  France  and  Germany, 
great  dangers  were  created  for  Italy  b.y  the  capture  of  Con- 
stantinople by  the  Ottomans,  and  by  the  efforts,  already  suc- 
cessful, to  find  a  sea  route  to  India.  Her  existence  was 
perhaps  to  be  called  in  question,  certainly  her  prosperity. 
In  fact  by  the  fall  of  the  Eastern  Empire  she  had  lost  the 
principal  source  of  her  commerce.  If  now  the  Portuguese 
closed  to  her  the  route  to  India  via  Alexandria  by  rendering 
this  route  useless,  and  if  the  Ottomans,  her  enemies  upon  the 
Greek  peninsula,  were  to  make  themselves  masters  of 
Egypt,  Italian  commerce  would  be  annihilated.  Let  us  add 
that  these  Ottomans,  who  were  soon  to  capture  Egypt, 
launched  their  cavalry  into  Friuli  and  their  fleets  upon  the 
Italian  shores.  The  doge  was  no  longer  the  sole  spouse  of 
the  Adriatic. 

Apparently  in  the  presence  of  such  perils  the  Italians 
would  have  no  other  thought  than  union.  This  was  in  fact 
the  first  sentiment  inspired  in  them  by  the  terrible  blow 
which  had  just  smitten  the  Greek  Empire.  They  forgot 
their  ancient  animosities  and  swore  eternal  concord  at  Lodi 
(1454),  a  precarious  peace  due  to  the  wisdom  of  the  great 
men  who  were  then  the  arbiters  of  Italian  destinies :  Fran- 
cisco Sforza,  Duke  of  Milan  ;  Cosmo  de  Medici,  to  whom 
Florence  had  decreed  the  beautiful  surname  Father  of  the 
Country  ;  Alphonso  V.  the  Magnanimous  ;  Popes  Calixtus 
III.  and  Pius  II.  (1455-64),  who  desired  that  every  morn- 
ing the  "bell  of  the  Turks"  should  be  rung  throughout 
all  Christendom. 

But  Alphonso  died  (1458).  The  Angevine  prince  John 
of  Calabria  claimed  his  crown  and  Italy  was  thrown  into 
inextricable  confusion.  The  Pope  diverted  Scanderbeg 
from  his  heroic  struggle  to  mix  him  up  with  those  impious 
wars  (1462).  He  sustained  John  of  Calabria.  Francisco 
Sforza,  who  also  dreaded  a  French  pretender,  the  Duke  of 
Orleans,  heir  of  the  Viscontis,  whom  he  had  dispossessed, 
took  sides  for  the  Aragonese,  and  aided  Ferdinand,  King  of 
Naples,  to  repulse  his  competitor  (1463). 


58     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.      [BOOK  I. 

Peace,  re-established  in  the  peninsula  by  the  defeat  of 
John  of  Calabria  at  Troja,  was  anew  compromised  by  the 
almost  simultaneous  death  of  Cosmo  (1464),  of  Francisco 
Sforza  (1466),  and  of  Pius  II.,  who  expired  at  Ancona  in 
sight  of  the  fleet  upon  which  he  was  to  cross  to  Greece  (1464). 
In  1478  coalition  against  Florence ;  in  1482  coalition 
against  Venice.  The  Ottomans  took  advantage  of  this  con- 
dition of  things.  They  surprised  Otranto  (1480),  butchered 
or  made  slaves  12,000  Christians,  and  sawed  the  governor 
in  two.  Italy  grew  accustomed  to  the  dread  of  the  Otto- 
man as  she  had  grown  accustomed  to  her  tyrants.  The 
generation  of  superior  men  whom  she  possessed  at  the 
middle  of  the  century  left  only  unworthy  successors.  Let 
us  look  into  the  interior  of  each  state  and  then  we  shall 
see  under  the  splendor  of  a  material  and  corrupt  civiliza- 
tion all  the  signs  of  political  and  moral  death. 

At  Milan  the  Sforzas  since  1450  had  replaced  the  Vis- 
contis.  The  fortune  of  this  family  was  remarkable.  One 
day  at  the  beginning  of  the  fifteenth  century  the  peasant 
Attendolo  while  he  was  working  in  the  fields  saw  soldiers 
pass  ;  he  threw  down  his  spade  and  ran  to  enlist ;  he  pos- 
sessed courage  and  intelligence;  he  changed  his  name  into 
that  of  Sforza  (the  brave),  became  a  captain,  chief  of  a  com- 
pany of  bandits,  the  most  dreaded  condottieri  of  Italy,  and 
bequeathed  his  renown,  his  talents,  his  soldiers,  and  a  num- 
ber of  strongholds  to  his  natural  son,  Francisco  Sforza,  who 
obtained  from  the  Pope  the  march  of  Ancona,  then,  in  the 
interests  of  Venice  and  Florence,  defeated  the  Duke  of 
Milan,  who  disarmed  him  by  the  gift  of  his  daughter's  hand. 
The  duke  dead,  Milan  became  a  republic  and  engaged 
Sforza  to  protect  her  against  Venice.  He  defended  her  at 
first  and  conquered  the  Venetians,  but  then  subdued  the 
Milanese  and  obliged  them  to  proclaim  him  duke  (1450). 
He  reigned  sixteen  years,  respected  by  the  sovereigns,  who 
sought  his  alliance,  as  did  Louis  XL,  to  whom  he  sent  suc- 
cor during  the  League  of  Public  Welfare.  His  unworthy  son, 
Galeazzo  Maria,  extended  over  all  the  duchy  a  rapacious  and 
violent  tyranny  which  no  longer  respected  the  honor  or  life 
of  the  citizens.  In  the  midst  of  his  guards  he  was  assassi- 
nated by  the  grandees  in  the  church  of  St.  Stephen  (1476). 
He  left  a  child  eight  years  old,  Giovanni  Galeazzo,  who  suc- 
ceeded him  under  the  guardianship  of  his  mother,  Bonna  of 
Savoy,  and  of  the  chancellor  Simonetta.  But  the  uncle  of 


CHAP.  V.]  GERMANY  AND  ITALY  FROM  1453  TO  1494.     59 

the  young  prince,  Ludovico  Sforza,  surnamed  il  Moro,  put 
the  minister  to  death,  drove  away  the  regent,  and  governed  in 
the  name  of  his  nephew,  whom  he  declared  of  age  (1480). 
Quickly  throwing  aside  the  mask,  he  shut  up  Giovanni  Gale- 
azzo  in  the  castle  of  Pavia  with  his  young  wife  Isabella, 
granddaughter  of  the  King  of  Naples,  who  menaced  the 
usurper  with  war  if  he  did  not  restore  the  power  to  the 
legitimate  sovereign.  It  was  then  that  Ludovico,  fearing 
there  would  be  formed  a  league  of  Italian  states  against 
him,  invited  Charles  VIII.  to  cross  the  Alps. 

Nevertheless  the  Milanais  was  always  one  of  the  richest 
countries  of  the  world,  and  the  Lombards  continued  as  in  the 
Middle  Ages  to  be  bankers  for  a  part  of  Europe,  thanks  to 
the  abundance  of  capital  which  a  perfected  agriculture, 
flourishing  manufactures,  and  extended  commerce  collected 
in  their  hands.  They  hurried  in  crowds  to  the  fair  of  Beau- 
caire  and  to  that  of  Lyons,  which  Louis  XL  had  just  estab- 
lished. At  Bruges  and  Flanders  they  possessed  a  great 
entrepot  of  their  merchandise,  which  from  there  spread 
into  the  north  of  France,  into  Germany  and  England  ;  the 
vessels  of  the  Hanseatic  League  thence  transported  it 
even  as  far  as  the  Scandinavian  countries.  They  also  culti- 
vated the  arts.  Ludovico  il  Moro  retained  at  Milan  the 
illustrious  Leonardo  da  Vinci  and  continued  the  cathedral, 
that  marble  mountain  covered  by  an  entire  population  of 
statues  which  is  eclipsed  in  grandeur  only  by  St.  Peter's  at 
Rome. 

As  to  Genoa,  ceded  by  Louis  XL  to  Francisco  Sforza  in 
1464,  she  recovered  a  few  moments  of  liberty  after  the  death 
of  Galeazzo  Maria  in  1476,  only  to  fall  once  more  under  the 
yoke  of  Ludovico  il  Moro,  who  obtained  from  Charles  VIII. 
the  investiture  of  Genoa  as  a  fief  of  the  French  crown 
(1490). 

The  first  rank  among  Italian  states  belonged  to  Venice. 
During  fifty  years  she  had  profited  by  every  discord  to 
increase  her  power.  From  1423  to  1453  she  acquired  four 
provinces  on  the  Italian  peninsula,  but  these  ruinous  acqui- 
sitions had  diminished  her  revenues  100,000  ducats.  When 
the  terrible  news  of  the  capture  of  Constantinople  by 
Mohammed  II.  fell  upon  Italy,  she  rallied  to  the  other 
princes  and  signed  with  them  the  peace  of  Lodi ;  but  the 
following  year  she  forgot  the  crusade  and  treated  with 
Mohammed  II.  When  reproached  with  this  hasty  defection 


60     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

the  Venetians  replied  :  "  We  are  Venetians  first,  Christians 
second."  However,  their  possessions  in  the  Archipelago 
and  in  Greece  rendered  peace  with  the  Ottomans  impos- 
sible. War  broke  out  in  1464  ;  the  Ottomans  captured 
Negropont  and  Scutari,  crossed  the  Piave,  and  ravaged 
everything  as  far  as  the  lagoons.  From  Venice  the)'  saw 
the  conflagration.  She  treated  once  more,  and  this  time 
submitted  to  shameful  conditions  ;  she  paid  tribute  to  the 
Mussulmans  (1479).  But  four  years  earlier  she  had  acquired 
Cyprus  by  maintaining  in  the  island  one  of  her  patricians, 
Catherine  Cornaro,  "  the  daughter  of  St.  Mark,"  who 
declared  the  republic  her  heir  in  1489.  Venice  did  not 
scruple  to  demand  of  the  Sultan  of  Egypt  investiture  of  this 
ancient  kingdom  of  the  Lusignans. 

Venice  seemed  then  at  the  apogee  of  her  power.  With 
her  3000  ships,  her  30,000  sailors,  her  numerous  and  veteran 
army,  her  famous  factories  of  plate  glass,  silk  stuffs,  and 
gold  and  silver  objects,  her  immense  commerce,  and  her 
despotic  but  skillful  government,  she  could  have  played  a 
mighty  role  against  the  stranger  ;  but  "  she  remained  apart 
in  her  importunate  and  mad  ambition,  believing  that  the 
wind  blew  always  on  her  stern,  and  never  considering  it  a 
fault  to  gain  at  the  expense  of  each  ;  thus  was  she  hated 
by  all."  This  hatred  was  first  shown  in  1482.  The  Duke 
of  Ferrara  had  attempted  to  establish  salt  works  at  Com- 
niachio  in  order  to  escape  buying  salt,  according  to  the 
treaties,  in  the  warehouses  of  Venice.  Venetian  opposition 
to  this  attempt  was  the  pretext  for  a  league  formed  by  all 
the  princes  against  her.  The  true  cause  was  the  jealousy 
which  Venice  inspired.  The  King  of  Naples,  Milan,  Man- 
tua, Florence,  and  soon  the  Pope,  sustained  the  Duke  of 
Ferrara.  But  Venice  braved  the  armies  of  the  allies  like 
the  excommunications  of  the  Pope,  and  at  the  peace  gained 
Polesina  from  Rovigo. 

She  had  also  a  government  fully  able  to  bestow  on  her, 
if  not  liberty,  at  least  power  and  wealth.  As  far  as  possible 
she  had  developed  her  aristocracy.  The  authority  of  the 
doge,  already  so  sustained  by  the  Grand  Council,  and  then 
by  the  Council  of  the  Ten,  had  become  purely  nominal  after 
the  creation  in  1454  of  the  three  state  inquisitors,  now  the 
real  masters  of  Venice.  They  could  without  giving 
account  of  their  decision  pronounce  sentence  of  death  and 
dispose  of  the  public  funds.  Justly  the  ambition  of  these 


CHAP.  V.]  GERMANY  AND  ITALY  FROM  1453   TO  1494.     61 

three  men  was  feared,  to  whom  all  authority  was  com- 
mitted; hence  two  with  the  approval  of  the  doge  could  con- 
demn the  third.  The  three  inquisitors  of  state  had  the 
right  of  making  their  own  statutes,  and  of  changing  them  as 
they  pleased,  so  that  the  republic  was  ignorant  even  of  the 
law  which  governed  it.  To  this  regime  Venice  owed  an 
internal  peace  which  contrasted  with  the  ceaseless  agita- 
tions of  the  other  Italian  cities.  Everywhere  was  admired 
the  wisdom  of  this  government,  which  maintained  its  sub- 
jects in  tranquillity,  and  knew  how  at  the  same  time  to  pro- 
cure their  welfare  by  assuring  them  labor.  No  city  was 
vaunted  like  Venice  for  its  pleasures,  and  for  the  luxurious 
life  there  led  by  the  rich  and  ofttimes  by  the  people.  But 
there  the  spy  and  the  informer  reigned,  being  encouraged, 
paid,  and  organized,  and  terror  hovered  over  every  head, 
so  that  material  prosperity  was  insufficient.  The  noble  who 
spoke  ill  of  the  government  was  twice  warned,  the  third 
time  drowned;  every  workman  who  exported  any  commodity 
useful  to  the  republic  was  stabbed.  Judgment,  execution, 
all  was  secret.  The  mouth  of  the  lion  of  St.  Mark  received 
the  anonymous  denunciations,  and  the  waves  which  passed 
under  the  Bridge  of  Sighs  carried  away  the  corpses. 

To  preserve  herself  from  the  ascendancy  of  generals  and 
the  influence  of  armies  Venice  employed  only  condottieri 
and  foreign  chiefs,  near  whom  she  kept  as  supervisors  two 
proveditors.  Thus  without  peril  she  was  unable  to  under- 
take offensive  war  and  win  conquests,  for  she  floated  always 
between  the  fear  of  too  great  success,  which  would  render 
the  general  too  powerful,  and  of  treason,  which  would  make 
him  pass  to  the  enemy.  The  trial  of  the  condottiere  Car- 
magnola  had  been  carried  on  during  eight  months  without 
the  count  having  any  intimation  of  the  danger  which  he 
ran  ;  he  was  left  at  the  head  of  his  army  and  heaped  with 
honor  when  he  had  been  already  condemned  to  perish 


On  the  other  side  of  Italy  in  the  valley  of  the  Arno  rose 
Florence  the  Beautiful.  Long  troubled  by  the  quarrel  of 
the  Guelphs  and  Ghibellines,  she  had  found  peace  again 
only  in  1343,  when  all  the  classes  of  the  population  were 
confounded  in  political  equality.  The  nobles,  long  held 
apart  from  government,  were  raised  to  the  rank  of  citizens. 
The  constitution  of  Florence  was  remarkable  ;  the  execu- 
tive power  belonged  to  a  college  of  six  priors  which  was 


62     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.      [BOOK  I. 

renewed  every  two  months  ;  the  legislative  power  to  two 
assemblies,  the  council  of  the  people  and  the  council  of  the 
commune,  whose  members  were  nominated  for  four  months. 
In  order  to  avoid  cabals  they  had  recourse  to  lot,  both  for 
the  nomination  of  the  councilors  and  for  that  of  the  priors. 
Moreover,  the  general  assembly  of  the  people  remained  sole 
sovereign,  and  must  be  convoked  every  time  that  there  was 
a  question  of  modifying  fundamental  law. 

Just  as  the  Athenian  democracy  excluded  the  metoikoi, 
or  domiciliated  strangers,  from  its  bosom,  the  Florentine 
democracy  did  not  admit  to  political  power  the  non-privi- 
leged artisans,  the  Ciompi,  or  Wooden  Shoes.  The  latter 
rose  in  1378.  But  the  citizens  remained  masters  of 
authority. 

This  victory  profited  only  the  great  families  of  the  city, 
first,  that  of  the  Albizzis  ;  second,  that  of  the  Medicis.  This 
house,  which  was  to  become  so  powerful,  had  rendered  itself 
popular  by  raising  the  citizens  of  the  second  class,  or,  as 
they  said  at  Florence,  the  minor  arts,  to  political  rights. 
After  Sylvestro,  Cosmo  de  Medici  acquired  by  commerce, 
and  especially  by  banking,  an  immense  fortune.  He  used  it 
to  assist  the  poor  and  to  gain  friends  among  the  rich  by 
lending  them  money.  He  found  himself  quickly  the  bene- 
factor or  the  creditor  of  the  majority  of  the  Florentine 
citizens.  At  this  the  Albizzis  took  umbrage  and  banished 
him.  But  this  exile  established  his  power ;  at  the  end  of 
a  year  Cosmo  returned  in  triumph  (1434).  It  depended 
only  upon  himself  whether  he  would  assume  the  supreme 
power.  He  cared  little  for  a  sounding  title  :  his  authority 
was  only  the  more  absolute  and  more  durable.  All  public 
functions,  all  the  offices,  belonged  to  his  friends.  He  was 
in  appearance  a  simple  banker  ;  in  reality  he  was  the  master, 
and  continued  such  all  his  life  (1434-64). 

Those  were  glorious  years  for  Florence.  The  shadow  of 
republican  government  existed,  and  that  sufficed  for  much. 
Peace  and  order  reigned  to  the  profit  and  satisfaction  of  all. 
Letters  and  arts  flourished,  thanks  to  the  protection  of 
Cosmo  and  to  the  increasing  progress  of  industry  and  com- 
merce; thus  grateful  Florence  decreed  to  her  chief  the  name 
of  Father  of  his  Country.  He  expended  6,000,000  dollars 
in  the  construction  of  palaces,  hospitals,  and  libraries,  but  he 
led  himself  the  most  simple  life,  and  instead  of  seeking 
princely  alliances  for  his  children,  he  married  them  into 


CHAP.  V.]  GERMANY  AND  ITALY  FROM  1453   TO  1494.     63 

Florentine  families,  so  that  his  sons  remembered  they  were 
the  equals  of  their  fellow-citizens  before  being  their  rulers. 
But  after  the  first  generation,  heredity  of  power  in  a  family 
of  parvenus  produced  its  too  common  results  ;  the  Medicis 
forgot  their  citizen  origin,  considered  themselves  as  princes, 
and  Florence  lost  even  the  appearance  of  its  ancient  liberty. 

This  liberty  in  1465  w;is  demanded  back  from  Pietro  I., 
by  the  nobles.  He  foiled  their  plots,  but  one  of  his  sons 
fell  their  victim  (1478).  Pope  Sixtus  IV.,  blinded  by  his 
affection  for  one  of  his  nephews,  Girolamo  Riario,  wished  to 
conquer  for  him  a  principality  in  the  Romagna.  This  would 
have  destroyed  the  Italian  equilibrium  and  violated  the 
treaty  of  Lodi.  The  Florentines  protested.  Irritated  by 
this  resistance,  Riario  took  part  in  the  conspiracy  of  the 
Pazzis.  They  were  to  assassinate  Guiliano  and  Lorenzo  de 
Medici  during  mass  at  the  elevation  of  the  Host  (1478). 
Guiliano  was  slain,  but  Lorenzo  escaped  and  punished  the 
murderers.  Among  the  accomplices  was  the  Archbishop 
of  Pisa,  Salviati,  who  was  hung  in  his  pontifical  robes  at  a 
window  of  his  palace.  Therefore  an  excommunication  was 
launched  against  the  Medici  and  war  burst  forth,  in  which 
all  the  Italian  powers  took  part.  During  this  war  the 
Ottomans  sacked  Otranto. 

This  apparition  of  the  crescent  on  the  very  soil  of  Italy 
appalled  the  princes.  Sixtus  IV.  opened  his  eyes  and  con- 
sented to  treat.  Peace  was  anew  established  by  the  pru- 
dence of  Lorenzo  de  Medici,  who  betook  himself  to  Naples 
in  order  to  negotiate  with  Ferdinand. 

Lorenzo  deserved  his  surname  of  Magnificent  and  Father 
of  the  Muses  by  his  zeal  for  learned  men  and  artists.  He 
welcomed  the  Greeks  driven  from  Constantinople,  had 
Plato  translated  by  Ficino,  published  an  edition  of  Homer 
by  Chalcocondylas,  encouraged  Angelo  Politano,  an  eru- 
dite poet,  le  Poggio,  a  learned  man  of  letters,  and  had  cast 
by  Ghiberti  the  doors  of  the  baptistery  of  St.  John, 
"  worthy,"  said  Michael  Angelo,  "  to  be  the  gates  of  para- 
dise." In  1490  Lorenzo,  ruined  by  his  magnificence,  was 
almost  bankrupt.  Florence  to  save  him  from  this  disgrace 
became  bankrupt  herself.  She  reduced  by  one-half  the 
interest  on  the  public  debt  and  by  one-fifth  the  nominal 
value  of  the  specie  deposited  in  the  treasury,  whence  it  was 
issued  at  its  former  rate.  A  single  voice  dared  to  protest 
against  this  omnipotence  of  the  Medici,  that  of  the  Domini- 


64     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.      [BOOK  I. 

can  monk  of  Ferrara,  Girolamo  Savonarola.  He  wished 
to  restore  to  the  clergy  purity  of  manners  ;  to  the  people, 
liberty  ;  to  letters  and  the  arts,  religious  sentiment.  When 
Lorenzo  was  on  his  deathbed  in  1492  he  adjured  him  to  give 
back  liberty  to  Florence,  demanding  it  as  the  price  of  abso- 
lution. Lorenzo  refused.  "  Then,"  cried  the  monk,  "  the 
time  has  come.  A  man  will  arise  who  in  a  few  weeks  will 
invade  Italy  without  drawing  the  sword.  He  will  pass  the 
mountains  like  Cyrus,  and  the  rocks  and  fortresses  will  fall 
before  him." 

The  son  of  Lorenzo,  Pietro  II.,  showed  only  incapacity. 
He  isolated  himself  from  the  plebeians,  lived  like  a  prince, 
and  aroused  violent  hatred  by  his  debaucheries.  Two 
parties  were  then  formed  in  the  city — that  of  the  young 
nobles,  the  arrabiati,  or  madmen,  and  that  of  the  people, 
the  fratesc/ii,  or  friends  of  the  monks.  Savonarola  was  at 
the  head  of  the  latter.  The  disorders  of  Pietro  only  con- 
firmed the  monk  in  the  thought  that  a  terrible  punishment 
was  reserved  for  Italy ;  and  he  himself  was  one  of  those 
who  made  the  highways  easy  for  the  foreign  conqueror. 
"  O  Italy  !  O  Rome  !  "  said  Savonarola.  "  The  barbar- 
ians are  coming  famished  like  lions  .  .  .  and  the  mortal- 
ity shall  be  so  great  that  the  grave  diggers  will  go  through 
the  streets  crying,  '  Who  has  any  dead  ?'  and  then  one  will 
bring  out  his  father,  another  his  son.  .  .  O  Rome !  I 
repeat  it  to  thee,  do  penance  ;  do  penance,  O  Venice  ! 
O  Milan  !  " 

The  Council  of  Basel  had  ended  the  schism  of  the  Church, 
and  after  1447  Christianity  had  but  one  chief,  Nicholas  V., 
a  lettered  man  and  protector  of  the  learned.  The  conspir- 
acy of  Stefano  Porcaro  (1453),  who  endeavored  to  establish 
at  Rome  the  republican  government,  and  the  capture  of 
Constantinople  by  the  Ottomans,  against  whom  he  himself 
preached  a  crusade  in  1455,  had  troubled  his  pontificate. 
His  successor,  the  Spaniard  Alphonso  Borgia,  Pope  under 
the  name  of  Calixtus  III.,  had  prepared  the  way  for  honors 
to  his  family,  which  was  destined  to  a  shameful  celebrity. 

In  1458  the  pontifical  tiara  had  been  given  to  the  former 
secretary  of  the  Council  of  Basel,  ^Eneas  Silvius  Piccolomini, 
celebrated  as  Pius  II.  Pope  Paul  II.  (1464-71)  was  still 
animated  by  the  grand  thought  of  the  crusade.  He  sus- 
tained Scanderbeg,  he  armed  the  Persians  against  the  Otto- 
mans :  but  after  him  commenced  a  deplorable  period  in  the 


CHAP.  V.]  GERMANY  AND  ITALY  FROM  1453   TO  1494.     65 

history  of  the  papacy.  During  more  than  half  a  century 
the  pontiffs,  many  of  whom  were,  however,  remarkable  for 
their  genius,  forgot  the  interests  of  Christianity  to  think 
only  of  their  family  or  their  temporal  dominions.  We  have 
seen  the  efforts  of  Sixtus  IV.  (1471-84)  to  create  a 
sovereignty  for  his  nephew.  The  feeble  Innocent  VIII. 
(1484-92)  did  not  make  the  pontificate  enter  upon  better 
ways.  After  him  the  Church  had  the  grief  and  shame  of 
seeing  in  the  chair  of  St.  Peter  Alexander  VI.,  the  second 
Pope  of  the  Borgia  family.  His  election  was  disgraced  by 
the  most  flagrant  simony,  his  pontificate  by  debauchery, 
cruelty,  and  perfidy.  He  was  not  deficient,  however,  in  skill 
and  penetration  ;  he  excelled  in  council,  and  knew  how  to 
conduct  important  affairs  with  marvelous  address  and 
activity.  It  is  true  he  always  played  with  his  word,  but 
the  Italy  of  that  day  held  integrity  and  good  faith  in  ex- 
ceedingly small  esteem. 

The  Roman  state  was  then  a  prey  to  a  crowd  of  petty 
tyrants  and  desolated  by  their  bloody  rivalries.  There 
were  wars,  assassinations,  and  continual  poisonings.  At  the 
very  doors  of  Rome  the  Colonnas  and  Orsinis  boasted 
that  they  were  the  handcuffs  of  the  Pope.  Alexander  VI. 
succeeded  by  means  of  ruse  and  cruelty  in  destroying  or 
subjugating  all  these  lords.  In  this  undertaking  no  one 
seconded  him  better  than  his  son,  Caesar  Borgia,  who  had 
chosen  as  device,  "  Aut  Caesar,  aut  nihil."  Handsome,  edu- 
cated, and  brave,  but  corrupt  and  evil,  this  man,  capable  of 
striking  off  the  head  of  a  bull  with  a  single  blow  of  his  saber, 
and  of  pursuading  everything  he  wished  by  the  enchant- 
ment of  his  speech,  used  hardly  any  weapons  except  lying, 
poison,  and  the  dagger.  He  meditated  his  blows  calmly, 
took  his  time,  and  acted  in  silence  ;  secretissimo,  says 
Machiavelli,  his  secretary  and  panegyrist.  "What  has  not 
been  done  by  noon,"  he  often  repeated,  "  will  be  done  in  the 
evening."  No  crime  was  repugnant  to  him  ;  he  contributed 
more  than  any  other  to  merit  for  Italy  the  surname  "  the 
Poisonous  "  given  her  by  the  writers  of  the  time.  However, 
he  could  not  reap  the  fruit  of  his  efforts.  Scarcely  had  he 
acquired  the  Romagna  when  his  father  died.  Says  Machi- 
avelli, "  He  had  prepared  everything,  foreseen  everything, 
save  that  he  was  to  be  at  death's  door  at  the  moment  when 
his  father  was  dying."  .  The  father  and  the  son  had  drunk 
by  inadvertence  a  poison  which  they  destined  for  a  cardinal. 


66  REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER. 

As  he  had  betrayed  everyone  so  he  was  betrayed  ;  impris- 
oned some  time  by  Ferdinand  the  Catholic,  he  lived  after- 
ward as  an  adventurer,  and  was  slain  before  a  paltry  town 
of  Navarre. 

In  the  kingdom  of  Naples  the  victory  of  Troja  in  1462 
had  placed  the  crown  upon  the  head  of  Ferdinand  I.,  but 
this  prince  apparently  endeavored  to  rouse  a  new  revolution 
by  reviving  hatred  instead  of  effacing  the  marks  of  civil 
strife.  The  harshness  of  his  government  having  excited  his 
nobles  against  him,  he  deceived  them  by  promises,  invited 
them  to  a  festival  of  reconciliation,  and  at  his  own  table  had 
them  seized  and  then  butchered.  The  people  were  not 
better  treated  than  the  grandees.  Ferdinand  monopolized 
for  himself  all  the  commerce  of  the  kingdom  ;  he  sold 
bishoprics  and  abbeys,  made  money  out  of  everything,  and 
knew  not  how  to  employ  this  money  in  defense  of  the 
state  :  thus  he  permitted  the  Ottomans  to  seize  Otranto  in 
1480,  to  massacre  its  population,  and  to  saw  its  governor  in 
two.  In  1484  the  Venetians  also  captured  Gallipoli  and 
Policastro  on  the  shores  of  his  kingdom.  Such  an  admin- 
istration rendered  a  catastrophe  inevitable  and  imminent. 

At  the  end  of  the  fifteenth  century  Italy  was  a  country 
of  rich  and  corrupt  civilization  ;  the  marvels  of  the  arts 
and  the  splendor  of  letters  poorly  concealed  its  precocious 
decline.  War  was  made  only  by  the  arms  of  the  condottieri, 
who  displayed  scientific  tactics  in  the  skirmish,  where  blood 
flowed  little,  and  who  gained  their  pay  as  cheaply  as  pos- 
sible. Fatal  sign  for  a  people  is  the  loss  of  military  virtues  : 
to  live  well  one  must  be  ready  to  die  well  ;  and  Italy 
trembled  before  a  sword  ;  so  she  held  in  honor  the  ruse, 
the  perfidy,  and  the  lie.  With  poison  or  the  poignard, 
questions  were  resolved  which  elsewhere  or  in  other  times 
would  have  been  cut  with  the  sword.  Italian  diplomacy 
was  a  school  of  crimes.  Surfeited  with  riches  and  given 
up  to  anarchy,  the  peninsula  was  a  prey  reserved  to  him 
who  should  dare  to  seize  it  first.  Charles  VIII.  wished  to 
take  it,  but  before  leading  him  thither  let  us  behold  other 
conquerers  who  also  were  approaching  its  shores. 


CHAPTER   VI. 
THE   OTTOMAN   EMPIRE   FROM    1453   TO    1520. 


Mohammed  II.  (1451-81). — Baiezid  II.  and  Selim  I.  (1481-1520). 


FOR  the  Ottomans  the  capture  of  Constantinople  had 
guaranteed  their  domination  in  Europe. 

Despite  their  conquests  even  to  the  banks  of  the  Danube 
and  the  shores  of  the  Adriatic,  Constantinople  while 
independent  was  for  them  a  perpetual 
(i«i°8ommedn'  menace.  One  disaster  could  deprive  them 
of  all,  could  hurl  them  back  into  Asia,  whence 
the  Greeks  and  the  fleets  of  Christian  powers,  at  last  con- 
scious of  the  danger,  would  have  prevented  their  coming 
forth. 

Constantinople  having  fallen,  their  establishment  in 
Europe  was  no  longer  a  camp  which  a  hurricane  could 
have  swept  away.  The  castle  of  the  Seven  Towers  re- 
placed the  desert  tent. 

Mohammed  II.,  the  seventh  Ottoman  emperor,  was  then 
obeyed  from  the  walls  of  Belgrade  on  the  Danube  to  the 
center  of  Asia  Minor.  This  empire,  already  formidable, 
had  two  enemies  :  on  the  west  the  great  body  of  Christian 
nations  who  had  easily  remained  indifferent  to  the  fate  of 
the  schismatic  Greeks,  but  who  would  not  permit  them- 
selves to  be  submerged  by  the  invasion  which  now  reached 
their  frontiers  ;  on  the  east,  at  the  center  of  Asia  Minor, 
the  Sekljoukian  principality  of  Caramania  (Koniah, 
Kai'sarieh),  and  behind  this  principality  after  its  fall 
had  come  (1464)  the  Persians,  animated  against  the  Otto- 
mans by  the  hatred  which  nearness  often  excites  between 
two  peoples,  and  which  religious  differences  envenom.  We 
shall  see  Mohammed  II.  and  his  successors  hurl  themselves 
against  these  two  barriers  ;  and  the  two  enemies  of  the  new 
empire  which  menaces  both  Europe  and  Asia  assist  each 


68    REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

other  in  arresting  its  progress.  To  a  success  upon  the 
Danube  often  replied  an  attack  along  the  Euphrates  ;  to 
a  victory  in  Asia,  a  new  war  in  Europe.  Nor  let  us  forget 
among  the  enemies  of  the  Ottomans  the  intrepid  troop  of 
the  knights  of  Rhodes,  of  that  island  which  hung  upon  the 
flanks  of  Asia  like  a  vigilant  sentinel  of  Christianity. 

To  them  let  us  add  the  raias  (flocks),  that  is  to  say,  the 
subjects.  For  the  moment  they  were  docile  and  trembling, 
but  more  numerous  than  their  masters,  at  least  in  Europe. 
Later  they  constituted  a  danger  for  the  empire,  inasmuch 
as  Mohammed  II.  granted  them  privileges  which  made  of 
them  a  national  body,  having  their  own  laws,  tribunals,  and 
chiefs,  as  also  their  own  language  and  religion.* 

The  Ottoman  government  was  a  despotism  like  that  of 
all  Asiatic  peoples.  The  sultan,  or  Padishah,  exercised 
absolute  power.  His  subjects  were  only  his  slaves,  whom 
he  exalted  or  reduced  to  nothingness  according  to  the 
caprices  of  his  will. 

This  despotism  was  limited  by  the  forces  even  upon 
which  it  rested.  Thus  the  Koran  was  placed  above  the 
sultan.  The  law  of  the  Prophet  was  the  law  of  all — of  the 
master  as  well  as  of  the  subjects.  Although  the  mouphti 
and  oulema,  charged  with  interpreting  the  Book,  had  no 
political  office,  the  people  often  listened  to  their  voice  when 
they  invoked  the  sacred  name  of  God  against  an  iniquitous 
or  dangerous  measure.  But  those  whom  the  sultans  had 
most  to  fear  were  those  who  served  them  best,  the  Janis- 
saries. This  chosen  soldiery  had  already  revolted  under 
Mourad  II.  If  we  except  the  nascent  army  of  France,  the 
Ottomans  had  at  this  period  an  incontestable  superiority 
over  the  Europeans  in  military  affairs.  They  had  more 
discipline,  a  larger  experience  in  the  art  of  fortifying 

*  With  a  spirit  of  toleration  none  other  in  Europe  had  thus  far  shown, 
Mohammed  II.  had  allowed  the  Greeks  the  free  exercise  of  their  religion, 
a  part  of  their  churches,  their  civil  laws,  tribunals,  and  schools,  and  had 
recognized  their  patriarch  as  chief  of  the  community  or  of  the  Greek 
nation  (Roum  Mileti),  the  latter  being  responsible  to  the  government  for  the 
preservation  of  order  in  his  nation,  and  for  the  payment  of  the  kharadj,  or 
poll  tax,  and  the  other  imposts,  and  being  for  that  purpose  invested  with 
much  temporal  authority.  The  Armenians  and  the  Jews  obtained  the  same 
privileges  and  the  same  organization,  so  that  below  the  dominant  nation 
there  were  three  other  regularly  constituted  nations.  In  our  day  this 
number  has  been  doubled,  immunities  having  been  granted  to  the 
Catholic  Armenians  (1829),  to  the  Protestant  Armenians  (1850),  and  to  the 
Catholics  (1854). 


CHAP.  VI.]     THE  OTTOMAN  EMPIRE,  1453   TO  1520.  69 

•  strongholds  and  of  casting  cannon,  and  in  the  skillful  em- 
ployment of  field  or  siege  artillery.  Moreover,  no  Christian 
power  then  had  the  capacity  or  the  idea  of  maintaining 
a  standing  army  so  numerous  as  that  of  the  sultan.  Let 
us  add  to  these  material  means  the  stimulating  energy  of 
fanaticism  and  of  martial  ardor,  and  we  shall  comprehend 
the  rapidity  of  their  progress.  "  Paradise  is  found  in  the 
shadow  of  the  sword,"  had  said  the  Prophet.  All  the 
Christian  nations  were  still  aristocratic  societies;  in  the 
Ottoman  nation  the  most  perfect  spirit  of  equality  pre- 
vailed. The  brave  man  could  aspire  to  everything,  for 
even  in  the  densest  crowd  and  among  the  slaves,  the  sultan 
sought  the  most  courageous  and  most  skillfur  to  make  of 
him  a  pasha  or  vizier.  In  all  these  characteristics  we  recog- 
nize that  the  Ottomans  possessed  a  great  superiority  over 
the  Christians  in  means  of  action  and  instruments  of  con- 
quest. This  explains  their  unbroken  successes  during  a 
century  which  is  filled  by  three  great  heroes — sultans 
Mohammed  II.,  Selim  I.,  and  Souleiman  I. — and  the  feeble 
Baiezid  II. 

To  the  first  is  due  the  glory  of  having  completed  the  con- 
quest of  the  Greek  Empire.  He  ma.de  himself  master  of 
the  duchy  of  Athens,  of  Corinth,  and  of  almost  the  whole 
Morea  (1458).  In  1461  he  took  Trebizond,  the  following 
year  the  island  of  Lesbos,  and  two  years  later  the  princi- 
pality of  Caramania,  whose  chief,  through  his  attacks  upon 
the  Ottoman  rear  in  Asia  Minor,  had  often  arrested  their 
progress  in  Europe.  The  Ottomans  resembled  then  a  for- 
midable advancing  tide  beating  alternately  its  opposite 
shores  ;  an  ocean,  dried  up  to-day. 

Venice,  which,  as  we  have  seen,  openly  avowed  that  she 
put  her  interests  above  those  of  Christianity,  had  obtained 
from  Mohammed  II.  (1454)  a  treaty  favorable  to  her  com- 
merce. Thus  she  made  small  efforts  to  second  Pope  Pius 
II.,  who  succeeded,  however,  in  uniting  the  Italian  powers 
against  the  Ottomans,  but  who  died  of  fatigue  at  Ancona 
at  the  moment  of  embarkation  (1464).  At  last  Venice, 
alarmed  by  their  progress,  commenced  the  war  on  her  own 
account,  but  with  no  result  save  ravaging  the  enemy's 
coasts. 

Against  Italy  a  serious  attack  was  difficult.  But  Hungary, 
situated  on  the  very  highway  of  invasion,  had  everything  to 
fear;  she  accepted  the  struggle  ;  Huniadi,  her  regent,  shut 


70     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BOOK  I. 

himself  up  in  Belgrade  at  the  confluence  of  the  Save  and 
the  Danube  ;  all  the  forces  of  Mohammed  II.  broke  them- 
selves against  it  (1456).  This  valiant  man  fell  in  the  midst 
of  his  triumph.  His  son,  Mathias  Corvinus,  replaced  him 
worthily.  Elected  king  in  1458,  he  defended  the  line  of  the 
Danube  with  success  against  all  the  attacks  of  the  sultan. 
Hungary  owes  him  her  first  standing  army  (the  Black 
Guard),  her  cannon  foundries,  and  her  university  at  Buda. 
He  was  the  greatest  of  her  kings  (1458-93).  He  would 
perhaps  have  inflicted  signal  disaster  upon  the  Ottomans  if 
he  had  not  wasted  his  strength  in  an  impolitic  struggle 
against  Bohemia  and  against  Frederick  III.  of  Austria,  who 
refused  to  restore  to  Hungary  the  crown  of  St.  Stephen,  and 
whose  capital,  Vienna,  Mathias  occupied  for  five  years. 

Arrested  at  the  north  by  the  Hungarians,  who  defended 
energetically  the  passage  of  their  rivers,  and  by  the  Rou- 
manians, who  intrenched  themselves  in  their  immense  for- 
tress the  Carpathians,  Mohammed  II.  returned  southward 
and  attacked  Albania.  Its  conquest  became  easy  when 
Scanderbeg  died  (1467).  This  intrepid  chieftain,  who  by 
his  courage  had  made  himself  Prince  of  Albania  (Epirus), 
had  during  twenty-three  years  repulsed  all  the  Ottoman 
attacks  and  gained  over  them  twenty-two  victories.  After 
his  death  the  Ottomans  divided  his  bones  to  wear  them  at 
their  necks  as  amulets  (1468).  Croia,  his  principal  fortress, 
did  not  surrender  until  ten  years  later.  In  1470  an 
immense  fleet  disembarked  an  Ottoman  army  in  the  Vene- 
tian island  of  Negropont.  After  four  terrible  assaults  the 
capital  of  the  island,  which  bore  the  same  name,  was  carried 
by  storm ;  not  one  of  its  defenders  or  of  its  inhabitants  was 
spared.  Happily  Mohammed  II.  was  then  called  to  the 
other  extremity  of  his  empire  by  the  Tartar  Ouzoun  Hassan, 
who  had  just  founded  in  Persia  the  dynasty  of  the  White 
Sheep,  and  whom  Pope  Paul  II.  stirred  up  to  attack  the 
Ottomans.  Hassan  was  beaten  (1473).  This  diversion 
had  none  the  less  its  desired  effect.  The  Moldavians,  com- 
manded by  Stephen  IV.,  the  "  athlete  of  Christ,"  defeated 
an  Ottoman  army  near  Racovitz  (1475)  •  m  Albania  and 
Greece  the  Ottomans  failed  in  two  attacks  against  Scutari 
and  Lepanto.  Mohammed  II.  was  not  accustomed  to 
defeat.  His  pride  was  roused.  On  the  one  side  he  launched 
his  fleet  against  Caffa,  a  rich  Genoese  emporium  on  the 
Black  Sea,  which  was  ruined  ;  and  on  the  other  a  countless 


CHAP.  VI.]     THE  OTTOMAN  EMPIRE,  1453   TO  1520.  71 

cavalry  penetrated  as  far  as  the  Piave  and  cast  terror 
throughout  all  Italy  (1477). 

Humbly  Venice  demanded  peace,  and  obtained  it  by 
restoring  Scutari,  and  by  an  annual  tribute  wherewith  she 
purchased  the  liberty  of  carrying  on  commerce  in  the  Black 
Sea  (1479).  1 he  following  year  an  Ottoman  fleet  seized 
Otranto,  on  the  coast  of  the  kingdom  of  Naples.  But  this 
city  was  recaptured,  and  the  Grand  Master  of  the  Knights 
of  St.  John,  Pierre  d'Aubusson,  defended  Rhodes  against 
the  Grand  Vizier,  who  after  three  months  of  ineffectual 
efforts  raised  the  siege.  Mohammed  II.  none  the  less 
formed  the  most  redoubtable  plans.  He  wished  to  march 
against  the  Mamelukes  of  Egypt,  swore  to  feed  barley  to 
his  horse  upon  the  altar  of  St.  Peter  at  Rome,  and,  when 
hearing  of  the  ceremony  whereby  the  Doge  of  Venice 
espoused  the  Adriatic,  promised  "  to  send  him  quickly  to 
the  bottom  of  that  sea  in  order  to  consummate  his  marriage." 
Sickness  arrested  all  these  designs.  He  died  at  Nicomedia 
at  the  age  of  fifty-three  (1481). 

Bai'ezid  II.,  a  savant  rather  than  a  soldier,  had  to  struggle 
against  his  brother  Zizim,  or  Djem,  who  disputed  the  power. 
BaVezid  ii  Thanks  to  the  genius  of  his  Grand  Vizier, 
and  seiim  i'. .  Achmet,  Bai'ezid  gained  the  day.  Not  long 
(1481-1520).  after  he  strangled  him  to  whom  he  owed  the 

empire.  The  conquered  Zizim  fled  to  Rhodes.  The 
knights  gave  him  a  brilliant  reception.  But  to  avoid  a 
war  with  the  sultan  Pierre  d'Aubusson  consented,  in 
return  for  an  annual  tribute  of  40,000  sequins,  to  prevent 
Zizim  from  returning  to  Turkey.  He  was  confined  in  a 
commandery  of  Poitou.  From  there  he  fell  into  the  hands 
of  Pope  Alexander  VI.  Charles  VIII.  during  his  Italian 
expedition  exacted  that  this  brother  of  Bai'ezid  should  be 
given  up  to  him.  Zizim  could  aid  him  in  the  conquest  of 
Constantinople.  The  unfortunate  prince  was  delivered 
up,  but  had  been  already  poisoned.  The  rumor  spread 
that  the  sultan  had  promised  300,000  ducats  to  the  sover- 
eign pontiff  if  he  would  rid  him  of  his  brother. 

Despite  his  pacific  inclinations  the  sultan  was  obliged 
to  occupy  the  Janissaries  ;  he  conquered  Bosnia,  Croatia, 
and  Moldavia.  The  Ottomans,  already  masters  of  Wal- 
lachia,  then  dominated  the  two  banks  of  the  Danube  (1489). 
But  Bai'ezid  soon  returned  to  his  favorite  tastes,  the  study 
of  letters,  and  a  short  war  against  Venice  alone  troubled 


72     REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER.     [BoOK  I. 

the  repose  of  this  indolent  and  voluptuous  prince.  He  was 
deposed  by  his  discontented  soldiers.  Selim,  his  fourth  son, 
girded  on  the  saber  and  commenced  his  reign  by  parricide; 
he  poisoned  his  father,  then  murdered  his  brothers  and 
their  children,  so  there  should  be  left  no  rivals  for  him  to 
fear  (1512). 

The  movement  of  conquest,  interrupted  under  Baiezid  II., 
recommenced  with  Selim  the  Ferocious.  To  his  warlike 
ardor  Selim  owed  the  affection  of  the  Janissaries  and  conse- 
quently the  power.  He  justified  their  hopes ;  two  Grand 
Viziers  were  successively  put  to  death  for  having  asked  him 
in  what  direction  his  imperial  tent  should  face  ;  that  is  to 
say,  toward  what  country  he  was  to  direct  his  arms.  A 
third  arranged  the  tents  toward  the  four  corners  of  the 
world.  "  That  is  the  way,"  said  he,  "  I  wish  to  be  served." 
During  the  eight  years  of  his  reign  without  cessation  he 
led  his  Janissaries  to  new  enterprises.  First  he  attacked 
Persia,  where  Ismail  had  just  founded  the  Sophi  dynasty. 
There  was  not  only  political  rivalry  between  the  two  peo- 
ples, but  also  religious  hate  ;  the  Persians  are  Schiites  ;  that 
is  to  say,  they  acknowledge  no  legitimate  successor  of  the 
Prophet  save  Ali,  the  fourth  caliph,  and  his  descendants  ; 
the  Ottomans  recognize  the  legitimacy  of  Aboubekir, 
Omar,  and  Othman,  and  defer  to  their  theological  explana- 
tions ;  they  accept,  in  a  word,  the  tradition,  or  Sunna, 
whence  their  name  Sunnites.  It  is  among  them  a  popular 
saying  that  the  death  of  a  single  Schiite  is  more  agreeable 
to  God  than  that  of  seventy  Christians  ;  so  before  entering 
upon  the  campaign  the  sultan  did  not  fail  to  make  in  his 
empire  a  rigorous  search  after  heretics  ;  he  found  40,000, 
who  were  all  put  to  death.  This  horrible  massacre  inau- 
gurated the  war.  The  two  armies  met  near  Tauris  in  Ader- 
bai'djan  and  engaged  in  a  terrible  battle.  The  Ottomans 
conquered,  thanks  to  their  artillery  ;  but  they  had  lost  40,000 
men,  and  this  day  is  still  for  them  a  day  of  mourning  (1514). 
The  Janissaries  compelled  Selim  to  retire  ;  the  only  result 
of  the  bloody  victory  was  the  temporary  possession  of 
Tauris. 

The  Mamelukes  had  ruled  for  more  than  two  centuries 
in  Egypt  and  Syria.  This  powerful  military  republic  was 
an  object  of  disquietude  and  jealousy  to  the  Ottomans. 
Selim  passed  the  Taurus  at  the  head  of  150,000  men  and 
penetrated  into  Syria,  which  was  opened  to  him  by  the  trea- 


CHAP.  VI.]     THE  OTTOMAN  EMPIRE,  1453   TO  1520.  73 

son  of  the  Governor  of  Damascus  and  Aleppo.  A  great 
battle  was  fought  near  the  latter  city ;  the  conquered 
Mamelukes  lost  their  sultan,  the  heroic  Kansou-Al-Gouri, 
who  died  of  exhaustion  and  rage  after  having  slain  with 
his  own  hand  forty  enemies. 

Syria  submitted  to  the  sultan  (1516).  The  victory  of 
Gaza  and  another  near  Cairo  gave  him  Egypt,  where  he  was 
received  as  liberator  by  the  native  population.  The  Copts 
delivered  to  him  more  than  20,000  Mamelukes,  whom  he 
slaughtered  in  a  single  day  and  whose  dead  bodies  were 
thrown  into  the  Nile.  Despite  this  massacre  Selim  was 
obliged  to  employ  a  part  of  the  Mameluke  beys  in  the  new 
administrative  organization  which  he  gave  Egypt ;  and  the 
Copts  as  well  as  the  fellahs  gained  from  the  Ottoman  con- 
quests only  an  aggravation  of  their  misfortunes  (1517). 
The  submission  of  Egypt  brought  about  that  of  the  Arab 
tribes  ;  the  Shereef  of  Mecca  came  to  offer  to  the  conqueror 
the  keys  of  the  Kaaba,  and  Selim  found  himself  master  of 
the  three  holy  cities,  Mecca,  Medina,  and  Jerusalem.  In 
1518  a  successful  expedition  against  the  Persians  acquired 
for  him  the  Diarbekir,  or  the  upper  part  of  the  Tigris  and 
Euphrates  basin. 

At  Cairo  Selim  had  found  Motavakkel,  last  descendant 
of  Abbas  the  Caliph,  whom  he  brought  to  Constantinople, 
where  he  died  in  obscurity.  But  Motavakkel  had  before 
this  intrusted  to  him  the  standard  of  Mohammed,  and  had 
resigned  to  his  hands  his  spiritual  authority.  So  the  sultan 
became  the  Commander  of  the  Faithful,  the  heir  of  the 
Prophet,  and  held  at  once,  in  the  language  of  the  Middle 
Ages,  the  two  swords,  that  of  temporal  authority  and  that 
of  spiritual  power. 

The  conquest  of  Egypt  had  another  result.  The  capture 
of  Alexandria  by  the  Ottomans  resulted  in  dealing  a  mortal 
blow  to  Venice ;  her  communications  with  the  East  were 
thenceforward  interrupted. 

To  these  vast  acquisitions  the  sultan  added  that  of 
Algiers,  which  a  pirate,  Horouk,  surnamed  Barbaroussa,  son 
of  a  potter  of  Mitylene,  had  in  1516  conquered  from  the 
Spaniards.  On  the  death  of  Horouk  his  brother,  Khaired- 
din,  succeeded.  But  seeing  himself  too  weak  to  resist  the 
Arabs  and  the  Christians,  he  addressed  himself  to  the 
Porte,  which  in  return  for  a  formal  act  of  submission 
granted  him  the  title  of  bey,  together  with  2000  Janissaries, 


74  REVOLUTION  IN  THE  POLITICAL  ORDER. 

artillery,  and  money.  Thanks  to  this  assistance  Khaired- 
din  drove  the  Spaniards  from  the  fort  which  they  occupied 
near  the  city,  and  by  sagacious  labors  made  the  harbor  of 
Algiers  a  redoubtable  place  of  rendezvous  for  his  pirates. 

So  in  a  few  years  Selim  had  almost  doubled  the  empire 
of  the  Ottomans.  Its  dominion  extended  from  the  Danube 
to  the  Euphrates,  and  from  the  Adriatic  to  the  cataracts  of 
the  Nile.  Masters  of  the  eastern  basin  of  the  Mediter- 
ranean, where  they  possessed  all  the  shores,  the  Ottomans 
had  just  acquired  the  important  port  of  Algiers  on  the 
western  basin  of  this  European  sea.  The  despotic  form  of 
their  government  assured  secrecy  to  their  policy  and  unity 
to  their  military  operations. 

Finally,  no  army  in  Europe  equaled  the  militia  of  the 
Janissaries.  At  that  moment  Selim  died,  and  Souleiman 
the  Magnificent  girded  on  the  saber  in  the  mosque  of 
Eyoub.  He  was  to  be  the  rival  of  his  two  great  contem- 
poraries, Francis  I.  and  Charles  V.,  the  friend  of  the  one, 
the  enemy  of  the  other  (1520). 


BOOK  II. 

CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  POLITICAL  REV- 
OLUTION. —  FIRST  EUROPEAN  WARS 
(1494-1559). 

CHAPTER    VII. 
ITALIAN  WARS  (1494-1516).] 


R/sum/  of  the  Preceding  Period. — Expedition  of  Charles  VIII.  into 
Italy  (1494). — Louis  XII.  (1498-1515). — New  Conquest  of  the  Milan- 
ais  by  Francis  I.  (1515). 


WHILE  studying  the  history  of  the  great  European  nations 

during  the  second  half  of  the  fifteenth  century   we  have 

,  ,         seen  one  general  fact  produced,  and  have  be- 

Resume  of  the     ,  .*»  ' 

preceding  pe-  held  society  resume  a  form  of  government 
which  had  been  lost  since  the  Roman  Empire, 
namely,  the  absolute  power  of  kings.  This  is  the  political 
side  of  the  great  revolution  which  was  being  accomplished, 
and  which  was  going  to  change  the  arts,  the  sciences,  the 
literatures,  and  even  for  half  of  Europe  the  beliefs,  at  the 
same  time  that  it  changed  the  institutions. 

The  inevitable  consequence  of  this  first  transformation 
which  placed  the  peoples  with  their  riches  and  strength  at 
the  disposition  of  the  kings  was  to  give  the  latter  the 
temptation  of  enlarging  their  states.  The  great  European 
wars  were  therefore  about  to  succeed  the  feudal  wars  as  the 
kings  succeeded  the  lords. 

The  second  period  of  Modern  Times  is  formed  for  us  by 
these  first  European  wars,  called  wars  of  Italy,  because  the 
possession  of  that  country  was  their  occasion  and  principal 
result. 

France  was  the  first  to  come  under  the  feudal  regime,  and 

75 


7^        CONSEQUENCES  Of  THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  It. 

with  her  kings  so  feeble  and  her  barons  so  haughty,  with 
her  innumerable  castles  and  her  chivalrous  literature,  she 
had  been  its  most  brilliant  exponent ;  she  was  also  the 
first  to  issue  from  it  in  order  to  put  on  a  new  and  powerful 
form.  Louis  XI.,  entirely  occupied  with  his  great  feudal 
battle,  had  said  :  "  The  Genoese  give  themselves  to  me  and 
I  give  them  to  the  devil."  But  the  battle  gained  and 
everything  well  ordered  within,  it  was  essential  to  look 
without,  were  it  only  thus  to  direct  the  activity  of  the  nobles 
and  make  them  pliant  to  political  obedience  by  accustoming 
them  to  military  discipline. 

Charles  VIII.,  it  is  well  understood,  saw  nothing  of  all 
this.  He  had  the  instinct  but  not  the  comprehension  of  his 
role.  The  foreign  policy  of  France  adopted  after  Louis  XI. 
was  a  necessity.  His  son  had  nothing  in  common  with  those 
men  who  resist  circumstances  and  control  them  ;  he  went 
therefore  where  they  pushed  him.  He  was  at  least  able  to 
choose  his  direction,  and  to  the  woe  of  France,  Italy,  and 
Europe  he  chose  the  worst. 

Louis  XI.  had  carefully  abstained  from  putting  forward 

the  rights  which  he  held  from  the  house  of  Anjou  to  the 

,  kingdom    of    Naples.     Charles   VIII.    drew 

Expedition    of  °  ,.    .     "  .    . 

Charles  vin.  them  from  oblivion  to  give  some  mighty  sword 
into  Italy  (1494).  tnrusts  beyond  the  mountains.  Experienced 
politicians  endeavored  in  vain  to  change  his  purpose.  Italy, 
besides,  had  just  thrown  herself  into  the  arms  of  France. 
Ludovico,  menaced  by  the  King  of  Naples,  called  Charles 
VIII.;  many  others  called  him  also,  as  did  the  Marquis  of 
Saluzzo  and  the  Neapolitan  barons  and  Savonarola  and  the 
cardinals  hostile  to  Alexander  VI.  "Noble  spirits!  well- 
beloved  Italy  !  "  cried  the  poet  Sannazaro,  "  what  madness 
presses  you  to  throw  away  the  Latin  blood  to  odious 
nations  ? " 

However,  as  far  as  the  situation  of  France  was  concerned, 
the  moment  was  badly  chosen  for  a  distant  expedition.  The 
neighboring  powers,  displeased  at  the  reunion  of  Brittany 
to  the  crown,  were  forming  a  league.  The  founder  of  the 
Tudor  dynasty,  Henry  VII.,  was  disembarking  an  English 
army  at  Calais  ;  Maximilian,  whom  Charles  VIII.  had  so 
vigorously  supplanted,  was  attacking  Artois  ;  the  King  of 
Spain,  Ferdinand  the  Catholic,  promised  to  cross  the  Pyre- 
nees. Splendid  occasions  for  war  were  thus  afforded.  But 
Charles  VIII.,  eager  to  depart,  preferred  to  negotiate : 


CHAP.  VII.]  ITALIAN    WARS  (1494-1516).  77 

treaty  of  Etaples  with  Henry  VII.,  who  on  the  promise  of  a 
sum  of  745,000  gold  crowns,  payable  in  fifteen  years,  re-em- 
barked ;  treaty  of  Senlis  with  Maximilian,  who  recovered 
for  his  son  Artois,  Franche  Comte",  and  Charolais,  conquests 
of  Louis  XI.;  treaty  of  Narbonne  with  Ferdinand  the  Cath- 
olic, to  whom  Cerdagne  and  Roussillon  were  restored,  with- 
out even  demanding  back  the  sums  expended,  and  against 
the  protestations  of  Perpignan,  which  wished  to  remain 
French.  All  those  were  frontier  provinces,  essential  to  the 
defense  of  the  kingdom  since  they  closed  the  Pyrenees,  the 
Jura,  and  the  Somme.  What  mattered  it  to  Charles  VIII.? 
The  submission  of  Italy  was  sure,  and  this  conquest  the 
commencement  of  a  still  higher  fortune.  From  Naples  he 
hoped  to  pass  to  Greece,  drive  out  the  Ottomans  from  Con- 
stantinople, and  like  a  valiant  knight  of  the  Middle  Ages 
replace  the  tomb  of  Jesus  Christ  under  the  protection  of  a 
Christian  kingdom  of  Jerusalem.  With  such  imprudence 
was  France  thrown  into  these  hazardous  expeditions  which 
turned  her  aside  from  internal  improvements  and  from 
aggrandizement  within  her  reach.  To  find  a  successor  to 
Louis  XI.  we  must  wait  for  Henry  IV.  and  Richelieu. 

A  splendid  and  well-equipped  army  assembled  promptly 
in  1494  toward  the  end  of  summer  at  the  foot  of  the  Alps. 
The  French  exulted  at  entering  into  that  land  of  mar- 
vels which  was  going  to  be  their  tomb.  There  were  3000 
lancers,  6000  Breton  archers,  6000  Gascon  arquebusiers, 
8000  Swiss,  and  50,000  common  soldiers,  with  150  heavy 
cannon,  "  a  merry  company,  but  little  discipline."  Bayard 
served  in  it  with  the  rank  of  squire.  Many  things  neces- 
sary to  so  great  an  enterprise  were  wanting ;  they  had 
neither  food  nor  campaign  equipages,  nor  ready  money. 
Heaven  provided  for  these  things.  "  The  journey,"  said 
Comines,  "  was  directed  of  God  as  much  so  as  to  the  going 
as  to  the  coming  back,  for  the  commander  and  the  guides 
were  worth  little." 

The  King  of  Naples  had  sent  his  brother  with  a  fleet  to 
Leghorn  and  Pisa,  and  his  son  with  an  army  on  the  other 
side  of  the  Apennines  toward  Ferrara  ;  one  was  to  guard 
the  approaches  by  sea,  the  other  the  land  route.  The  Duke 
of  Orleans  got  together  a  few  vessels  at  Marseilles  and 
defeated  the  former  at  Rapallo  ;  the  latter  did  not  dare 
even  wait  for  the  French  advance  guard  of  d'Aubigny. 
He  knew  that  the  Duke  of  Orleans  had  destroyed  every- 


7 8        CONSEQUENCES  OF   THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  II. 

thing  at  Rapallo  :  it  was  no  longer  a  war  of  condottieri,  of 
beautiful  passages  of  arms,  where  at  worst  one  was  dis- 
mounted and  made  to  pay  ransom,  but  a  cruel,  merciless 
war  without  quarter.  Dismay  took  possession  of  the  entire 
peninsula.  They  remembered  the  barbarians  ;  it  was  too 
late  to  send  away  the  foreigner  whom  they  had  summoned. 

Charles  VIII.  had  crossed  Mt.  Genevra  September  2. 
He  found  himself  destitute  of  money  at  the  very  beginning 
of  the  campaign.  After  having  danced  and  played  the 
agreeable  in  Turin  with  the  Duchess  of  Savoy  and  the 
Marchioness  of  Montferrat,  he  obtained  the  loan  of  their 
diamonds  to  continue  his  journey.  At  Genoa  he  borrowed 
100,000  francs,  on  which,  everything  reckoned,  he  paid  inter- 
est at  the  rate  of  forty-two  per  cent.  Sick  some  time  at  Asti, 
he  was  there  joined  by  Ludovico  il  Moro  ;  then  he  visited 
Galeazzo,  who  was  confined  in  the  castle  of  Pavia,  but  did 
not  allow  himself  to  be  touched  by  the  grief  of  the 
prisoner's  young  wife.  Ludovico  il  Moro  himself  in  person 
led  the  conqueror  across  his  duchy  to  the  frontiers  of 
Tuscany  ;  his  nephew  died  a  few  days  after  ;  it  was  com- 
monly believed  that  thus  he  had  purchased  the  right  of 
poisoning  him  and  taking  his  place.  The  two  fortresses  of 
Sarzana  and  of  Pietra  Santa  might  have  arrested  the  French 
army  ;  Pietro  de  Medici  brought  their  keys  to  the  king  in 
the  hope  of  being  maintained  in  Florence,  which  Savonarola 
was  rousing  against  him.  Pietro  was  nevertheless  driven 
out  by  the  people  on  his  return  to  the  cry  of,  "  No  more 
Medicis."  But  the  tribune  monk,  who  considered  Charles 
VIII.  as  an  envoy  of  God  for  the  scourging  of  Italy,  sought 
the  young  king,  and  introduced  him  into  the  city.  He 
entered  as  a  conqueror,  his  head  erect,  his  lance  upon  the 
thigh,  and  wished  to  levy  a  war  contribution.  On  a 
refusal  he  used  menaces.  "  Beat  your  drums,"  said  boldly 
the  gonfalonier  Capponi  in  order  to  terminate  the  exigencies 
of  this  bloodless  conqueror,  "  and  we  will  ring  our  bells  " 
(November). 

At  Rome  the  cardinals  and  the  lords,  maltreated  by 
Alexander  VI.,  opened  their  gates  to  the  French  as  libera- 
tors, and  urged  the  King  of  France  to  depose  the  incestu- 
ous and  simonaical  Pope,  who  had  taken  refuge  in  the 
castle  of  San  Angelo.  Charles  VIII.  pointed  his  cannon 
against  this  ancient  fortress  ;  he  obtained  from  the  pontiff 
his  son,  Cresar  Borgia,  as  guarantee  of  his  fidelity,  and  an 


CHAP.  VII.]  ITALIAN   WARS  (1494-1516).  79 

Ottoman  prince,  Djem,  or  Zizim,  the  brother  of  Sultan 
Baiezid  II.,  who  was  to  serve  the  ulterior  projects  of  the 
French  in  the  East  (December  31).  Some  days  later  the 
first  escaped  ;  the  second  died,  having  been  poisoned  before 
his  surrender.  But  the  end  of  their  expedition  was  reached 
on  the  frontiers  of  Naples. 

These  fell  of  themselves.  Ferdinand  I.  had  just  died. 
His  son,  Alphonso  II.,  abdicated  in  terror.  The  new 
sovereign,  Ferdinand  II.,  had  more  courage  and  wished  to 
fight  ;  at  San  Germano  he  found  himself  taken  between 
two  treasons,  one  in  his  army,  one  in  his  capital,  and  was 
forced  to  flee  to  the  island  of  Ischia,  whence  he  reached 
Sicily.  Not  a  lance  was  broken.  The  valets  of  the  army 
put  chalk  marks  in  Naples  upon  the  houses  which  their 
masters  were  to  inhabit.  Charles  VIII.  and  his  followers 
entered  this  capital  (February  22,  1495)  in  the  midst  of 
flowers  thrown  by  the  inhabitants.  There  was  as  in  every 
popular  caprice  an  enthusiasm  mingled  with  delirium. 
"  Never  a  people,"  said  the  French,  "  showed  so  much 
affection  to  a  king  or  a  nation."  The  report  of  this  rapid 
conquest  crossed  the  seas  ;  already  the  Greeks  began  to 
prepare  weapons  while  waiting  for  their  liberator,  "  the 
King  of  the  Franks." 

Once  there,  however,  the  conquerors  thought  only  of 
enjoying  their  easy  victory.  Charles  VIII.  had  himself 
crowned  King  of  Naples,  Emperor  of  the  East,  and  King 
of  Jerusalem.  He  showed  himself  to  the  Neapolitans,  the 
purple  upon  his  shoulders  and  the  golden  globe  in  his  hand, 
and  "  celebrated  many  a  gorgeous  tourney  and  pastime." 
His  companions  divided  the  fiefs  and  espoused  the  beauti- 
ful heiresses  at  the  expense  of  the  nobles  of  the  country. 
But  one  evening  two  months  after  the  would-be  conqueror  of 
Constantinople  and  Jerusalem  received  a  letter  from  Philip 
de  Comines,  the  historian,  his  ambassador  to  the  republic 
of  Venice.  A  formidable  league  of  the  sovereigns  of 
Europe  had  been  concluded  against  him  for  the  purpose  of 
closing  to  him  his  exit  from  Italy,  and  of  making  France 
re-enter  its  limits.  Ferdinand  II.  the  Catholic,  Maximilian, 
Henry  VII.,  were  its  instigators  ;  the  Italians  themselves 
who  had  called  the  French  or  who  had  promised  them 
fidelity — Ludovico  il  Moro,  Alexander  VI.,  and  Venice — had 
part  in  it.  The  Italian  powers  were  to  collect  40,000  men 
in  the  valley  of  the  Po,  while  the  other  confederates 


8o        CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  II. 

attacked  the  French  frontiers.  Already  the  Duke  of 
Orleans  was  hard  pressed  in  Novara.  The  jealousy  of 
Europe  against  France  was  revealed  for  the  first  time. 

There  was  need  of  haste.  Charles  left  11,000  men  under 
Gilbert  de  Montpensier,  whom  he  named  Viceroy  of  Naples, 
and  with  the  rest  sought  the  route  of  the  Apennines.  Great 
difficulty  was  experienced  in  passing  this  chain  through  the 
narrow  defile  of  Pontremoli  north  of  Sarzana  ;  the  Swiss 
harnessed  themselves  to  the  cannon,  the  nobles  themselves 
carried  the  munitions.  On  the  other  side  of  the  mountains 
in  the  valley  of  the  Taro.  the  French  discovered  the  army 
of  the  confederates,  25,000  strong,  barring  the  route  ;  they 
themselves  numbered  only  10,000.  Charles  nevertheless 
resolved  to  pass.  While  he  pushed  his  advance  guard 
along  the  Taro  he  was  attacked  in  the  rear  ;  he  faced 
about  against  his  assailants  ;  in  an  hour  3500  of  them  were 
slain  ;  the  others  fled.  The  Italians  attributed  this  prompt 
success  to  the  "  French  fury  "  rather  than  to  their  own 
cowardice.  However,  the  victory  of  Fornovo  served  only 
to  open  a  road  of  retreat  to  the  French  (July  6,  1495). 

Once  in  France  Charles  appeared  to  forget  Italy,  and  took 
no  measure  to  preserve  his  easy  conquest.  Gilbert  de 
Montpensier,  a  brave  knight,  but  who  "  never  rose  before 
noon,"  was  not  a  man  to  supply  of  himself  the  succors  he 
did  not  receive.  Ferdinand  II.,  starting  from  Sicily  with 
some  Spanish  troops,  surprised  Naples  the  morning  after 
the  battle  of  Fornovo,  and  shut  up  Montpensier  in  Atella, 
where  he  died  of  the  pest  ;  d'Aubigny  led  back  to  France 
the  remnants  of  the  French  garrisons.  The  French  domina- 
tion in  the  kingdom  of  Naples  had  fallen  as  quickly  as  it 
had  risen,  and  with  the  same  expressions  of  joy  on  the  part 
of  the  inhabitants. 

Italy,  hardly  delivered,  returned  to  its  divisions,  and  the 
civil  war  was  not  slow  in  bringing  back  the  foreign  war. 
Called  by  Ludovico,  the  emperor  Maximilian  passed  the 
Alps  as  had  done  Charles  VIII.  His  resources  by  no  means 
corresponded  with  his  pretensions.  He  wished  to  play  the 
role  of  Otto,  of  Charlemagne,  and  could  hardly  play  that 
of  a  condottiere.  With  a  small  army  he  attacked  the  Flor- 
entines, was  repulsed  before  Leghorn,  and  returned  to 
Germany.  By  this  ridiculous  proceeding  he  had  gained 
only  a  surname,  the  Penniless. 

The  civil  war  then  continued  :  in  the  Romagna  between 


CHAP.  VII.]  ITALIAN   WARS  (1494-1516).  81 

the  Pope  and  the  Roman  barons  ;  in  Tuscany  between  Pisa 
and  Florence ;  in  Florence  itself  between  the  partisans 
and  the  enemies  of  Savonarola.  The  latter  perished  upon 
the  funeral  pile  (1498),  but  his  death  did  not  restore  concord. 

In  France  Charles  VIII.,  warned  by  the  complaints  of  his 
people,  devoted  "his  imaginations,"  says  Comines,  "to 
wishing  to  live  according  to  the  commands  of  God,  to  put- 
ting justice  in  good  order,  and  to  well  arranging  the 
finances,"  when  he  died  from  an  accident  April  7,  1498,  at 
the  age  of  twenty-eight,  at  the  castle  of  Amboise,  which  he 
was  repairing.  Comines  has  said  of  him,  "  He  was  so  good 
that  it  would  not  be  possible  to  see  a  better  creature." 
With  him  the  direct  line  of  the  Valois  became  extinct,  and 
was  replaced  by  the  Valois  of  Orleans. 

Charles  VIII.  having  left  no  child,  the  crown  reverted  by 

right  to  Louis,  Duke  of  Orleans,  then  thirty-six  years  old, 

the  grandson    of  a   brother   of   Charles  VI. 

Louis        XII.       T         P  ,      .  .  . 

(1498-1515).  Louis  XII.  belonged  to  an  amiable,  active, 

and  intelligent  family,  popular  by  its  good 
qualities  and  even  by  its  defects.  His  grandfather  had 
been  a  brilliant  knight  ;  his  father,  a  poet  who  left  some 
charming  pieces  ;  his  uncle,  Dunois,  the  bravest  of  the 
captains  of  Charles  VII.,  and  one  of  the  names  of  old 
France  which  has  remained  popular.  Louis,  destitute  of 
superior  qualities,  was  distinguished  by  immense  good 
nature.  He  began  his  reign  by  diminishing  the  taxes,  and 
he  refused  the  gift  of  joyous  advent,  which  amounted  to 
300,000  livres. 

To  prevent  the  widow  of  Charles  VIII.  from  carrying 
her  duchy  of  Brittany  into  another  house,  he  espoused  her 
(1499).  Unhappily  after  giving  some  care  to  the  adminis- 
tration of  the  country  he  recommenced  the  fatal  expedi- 
tion of  his  predecessor. 

Heir  of  the  rights  of  Charles  VIII.  to  Naples,  he  also 
inherited  from  his  grandmother,  Valentine  Visconti,  claims 
to  the  Milanais,  usurped  by  Ludovico  Sforza.  He  resolved 
to  assert  them  :  to  the  Venetians  he  promised  Cremona  and 
Ghiara  on  the  Adda ;  to  Florence,  the  submission  of 
revolted  Pisa.  Caesar  Borgia  had  already  received  the 
French  duchy  of  Valentinois.  Trivulcio,  an  Italian  in  the 
service  of  Louis  XII.,  needed  only  to  show  himself  in  the 
Milanais  at  the  head  of  8000  horse  and  12,000  foot.  Lu- 
dovico, repulsed  by  everybody,  fled  to  the  Tyrol  (1499). 


82        CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  II. 

The  bad  administration  of  Trivulcio,  an  ancient  Guelph 
who  persecuted  his  adversaries,  encouraged  Ludovico  in 
the  hope  of  recovering  what  he  had  lost.  He  returned 
with  a  crowd  of  Swiss  and  German  adventurers,  surprised 
Milan,  and  drove  out  the  French.  But  Louis  XII.  de- 
scended the  Alps  with  a  new  army  and  met  his  competitor 
near  Novara  (1500).  The  Swiss  of  Ludovico  refused  to 
fight  against  their  compatriots  who  were  in  the  French 
army.  Ludovico  hoped  at  least  to  save  his  person  ;  he 
was  sold  by  a  Swiss  at  the  moment  when  he  endeavored  to 
escape  underthe  disguise  of  a  Franciscan  friar  or  of  a  soldier. 
He  was  sent  to  France,  shut  up  in  a  dungeon  of  the  castle 
of  Loches,  and  died  of  joy  twelve  years  after  when  learn- 
ing of  the  end  of  his  captivity. 

The  Milanais  being  conquered,  Louis  thought  of  Naples. 
First  he  made  certain  of  the  neutrality  or  support  of  the 
states  of  central  Italy.  The  Florentines  received  aid  from 
him  against  Pisa,  always  in  revolt.  Alexander  VI.  wished 
to  form  a  principality  in  the  Romagna  for  his  son,  Caesar 
Borgia,  at  the  expense  of  the  thousand  petty  tyrants  who 
were  transforming  that  country  into  a  resort  of  brigands. 
A  few  French  troops  enabled  this  man,  consummate  master 
of  cruelty  and  treason,  the  hero  of  Machiavelli  in  his  book 
'  The  Prince,"  to  sweep  away  the  petty  and  sanguinary 
feudalism  of  the  Romagna. 

Finally,  in  order  to  master  the  kingdom  of  Naples  with- 
out striking  a  blow,  Louis  shared  it  beforehand  with  Ferdi< 
nand  the  Catholic  (1500).  He  reserved  to  himself  the 
title  of  king,  with  the  capital,  the  Abruzzi,  and  Terra  di 
Lavoro.  Ferdinand  asked  only  Apulia  and  Calabria,  with 
the  title  of  duke.  Frederick,  the  unhappy  King  of  Naples,  a 
popular  prince,  confidingly  had  even  opened  his  fortresses 
to  Gonsalvo  of  Cordova,  the  general  of  the  King  of  Spain, 
"  who  thought  that  the  cloth  of  honor  must  be  of  contemp- 
tible texture."  When  he  demanded  assistance  from  him 
against  the  French,  who  were  already  on  the  frontier 
(June,  1501),  he  discovered  that  he  was  betrayed.  More 
irritated  against  a  traitor  than  against  an  enemy,  he  sur- 
rendered Naples  and  Castelnuovo  to  the  French,  and  put 
himself  in  the  hands  of  Louis  XII.,  who  offered  him  a 
peaceful  retreat  on  the  banks  of  the  Loire  (1501). 

After  the  conquest  was  concluded,  the  division  was  not 
made  so  amicably.  The  Spaniards  and  French  disputed 


CHAP.  VII.]  ITALIAN    WARS  (1494-1516).  83 

about  several  districts,  and  about  the  tax  paid  upon  the 
flocks  which  in  autumn  descended  from  the  heights  of 
the  Abruzzi  into  the  plains  of  the  Capitanate.  This  tax 
furnished  the  most  undisputed  revenue  of  the  kingdom. 
The  viceroy,  the  Duke  of  Nemours,  who  had  a  superior 
force,  shut  up  Gonsalvo  in  the  city  of  Barletta  (1502). 
But  Ferdinand  the  Catholic  allowed  his  son-in-law,  Philip 
the  Fair,  to  negotiate  with  Louis  XII.  a  treaty  which  sus- 
pended hostilities  and  permitted  him  to  send  re-enforce- 
ments to  Gonsalvo  ;  then,  disavowing  the  negotiator,  he 
continued  the  war.  Nemours  could  make  no  resistance. 
His  lieutenant  d'Aubigny,  beaten  at  Seminara,  lost  Cala- 
bria (April  21,  1503)  ;  he  himself  made  a  most  impru- 
dent attack  near  Cerignola  (April  28),  was  defeated  and 
slain  ;  Venousa  and  Gaeta  alone  remained  to  the  French. 

Louis  XII.  in  order  to  take  revenge  for  this  treason  sent 
to  the  Pyrenees  two  armies  which  accomplished  nothing, 
and  a  third  beyond  the  Alps  under  La  Tremoille  which  had 
no  better  fate.  Delayed  some  time  in  the  environs  of  Rome 
by  the  intrigues  which  the  election  of  a  new  Pope  occa- 
sioned, La  Tremoille  allowed  Gonsalvo  time  to  put  himself 
on  the  defensive,  was  conquered  on  the  Garigliano  despite 
the  courage  of  Bayard,  who  alone  defended  a  bridge  against 
two  hundred  Spaniards  (December  27),  and  was  forced  to 
surrender  in  Gaeta  (January  i,  1504).  Louis  d'Ars,  who 
commanded  at  Venousa,  sought  with  the  remainder  of  the 
army  the  road  to  France. 

There  was  reason  to  fear  that  the  loss  of  the  Milanais 
would  follow  that  of  the  kingdom  of  Naples.  Louis  XII. 
disarmed  his  enemies  by  the  first  treaty  of  Blois  (1504).  In 
return  for  the  investiture  of  the  Milanais,  he  renounced  the 
kingdom  of  Naples,  which  was  to  belong  to  Prince  Charles, 
the  sovereign  of  the  Netherlands,  the  heir  of  Austria  and 
Spain,  who  was  to  espouse  Mme.  Claude,  the  eldest 
daughter  of  the  king  and  of  Anne  of  Brittany.  Burgundy 
and  Brittany  were  to  be  her  dowry.  No  more  disastrous 
treaty  could  have  been  signed.  But  France  protested,  and 
Louis  XII.  seized  the  first  opportunity  for  gratifying  its 
wishes.  In  1505  Ferdinand  the  Catholic,  irritated  against 
his  son-in-law,  planned  to  disinherit  him  by  contracting  a 
second  marriage.  He  espoused  Germaine  de  Foix,  niece 
of  Louis  XII.  Louis  by  a  treaty,  also  signed  at  Blois 
(October,  1505),  ceded  anew  his  rights  to  Naples  to  his  niece, 


84        CONSEQUENCES  OF   THE  REVOLUTION     [BOOK  II. 

whereby  he  broke  one  of  the  principal  conditions  of  the 
marriage  of  Mme.  Claude.  Brittany  and  Burgundy  were 
still  pledged  by  the  preceding  stipulations  ;  to  break  these 
stipulations  openly  Louis  convoked  the  States  General  at 
Tours  (May  15,  1506).  They  declared  the  two  provinces 
inalienable  as  crown  dominions,  and  entreated  the  king  to 
marry  his  daughter  Claude  to  his  heir  presumptive,  Francis, 
Duke  of  Angouleme.  Louis  XII.  had  no  difficulty  in  grant- 
ing what  they  desired  of  him.  This  time  he  had  perhaps 
deceived  the  deceivers.  Neither  Maximilian,  who  was 
always  equally  ambitious  and  poor,  nor  Ferdinand,  charged 
after  the  death  of  Philip  the  Fair  with  the  guardianship  of 
his  grandson,  Charles  of  Austria,  made  complaint.  Louis 
XII.  could  even  the  following  year,  without  being  molested, 
make  Genoa,  which  had  revolted,  return  to  its  duty.  "  Now, 
merchants,"  cried  Bayard,  "defend  yourselves  with  your 
yardsticks  and  abandon  pikes  and  lances,  to  which  you  are 
not  accustomed."  The  fortress  of  the  Lantern  was  erected 
to  hold  them  in  submission  (1507). 

The  fall  of  Borgia  after  the  death  of  Pope  Alexander  VI. 
had  disastrous  consequences  for  the  pontifical  states : 
anarchy  reappeared,  and  in  its  train  civil  wars,  pillage,  and 
massacre.  "  Italy,"  said  Machiavelli,  "is  to-day  without  a 
chief,  without  institutions,  without  laws.  Conquered,  torn, 
crushed,  she  displays  only  ruins  to  the  eyes  of  her  children. 
And  yet,  utterly  humiliated  as  she  is  by  the  barbarians,  we 
see  her  disposed  to  follow  a  common  banner  if  a  man  arises 
to  grasp  such  a  banner  and  to  display  it." 

This  man  whom  Italy  demanded  was  Pope  Julius  II.,  an 
energetic  old  man  who  wished  to  be  "  the  lord  and  master 
on  the  world's  stage."  He  suffered  when  seeing  the  enemy 
in  the  peninsula,  and  proposed  to  drive  from  it  those  whom 
he  called  barbarians.  But  in  this  delivered  Italy  he  desired 
the  Holy  See  to  occupy  the  highest  place.  For  that  it  was 
necessary  to  restore  the  dominions  which  had  been  torn 
from  the  Church  and  which  Venice  retained.  He  com- 
menced with  her.  But  this  policy,  which  consisted  in  humili- 
ating the  Venetians  by  the  barbarians,  and  then  in  expelling 
the  latter  by  others,  reposed  on  a  very  uncertain  basis. 
Julius  II.  could  take  Italy  away  from  the  French  ;  he  gave 
it  to  the  Spaniards.  This  was  only  changing  masters. 

Venice  had  profited  by  all  the  disasters  of  Italy.  Each 
of  her  neighbors  believed  it  had  ground  of  complaint  against 


CHAP.  VII.]  ITALIAN   WARS  (1494-1516).  85 

her.  Louis  XII.  regretted  Cremona,  which  he  had  recently 
ceded  her,  and  Crema,  Brescia,  and  Bergamo,  formerly  lost 
by  the  duchy  of  Milan.  The  cession  of  a  few  cities  on 
the  eastern  shore  of  the  kingdom  of  Naples  had  paid  too 
dearly  in  the  mind  of  Ferdinand  the  Catholic  for  the  finan- 
cial assistance  which  he  had  received  from  the  republic 
against  the  French. 

Julius  II.  demanded  back  Ravenna,  Cervia,  Faenza,  and 
Rimini,  ancient  possessions  of  the  Holy  See.  Maximilian 
demanded  Verona,  Vicenza,  and  Padua  in  the  name  of  the 
empire,  and  Friuli  and  Trieste  in  the  name  of  the  house  of 
Austria.  All  these  jealousies,  all  these  passions,  coalesced 
at  Cambrai  against  the  republic  (December  10,  1508). 
Some  months  after  the  Pope  launched  an  interdict  against 
Venice,  its  magistrates,  its  citizens,  and  its  defenders. 

Louis  XII.,  who  was  ready  first,  crossed  the  Adda 
(May  8)  at  the  head  of  more  than  20,000  foot  soldiers  and 
2300  lancers,  and  attacked  L'Alviano,  a  condottiere  in  the 
service  of  Venice,  at  the  causeway  of  Agnadel  (May  14, 
1509).  The  Venetians  at  first  resisted  bravely,  but  Bayard 
and  some  determined  knights  plunged  into  the  marshes  and 
arrived  on  the  enemy's  flank.  This  attack  determined  the 
rout  of  the  Venetians.  Eight  to  ten  thousand  men,  with 
all  the  artillery  and  baggage,  remained  on  the  field  of 
battle.  This  victory  brought  the  French  as  far  as  the 
lagoons.  The  republic  was  saved  by  a  shrewd  act.  She 
withdrew  her  troops  from  all  the  cities  and  absolved  her 
subjects  from  their  oath  of  fidelity.  The  latter  felt  in 
honor  bound  still  to  remain  faithful,  though  obedience 
could  be  no  longer  enforced.  Thrown  back  upon  herself, 
and  impregnable  in  the  midst  of  the  sea,  Venice  waited 
until  discord  broke  out  among  the  allies.  This  soon  hap- 
pened. 

Pope  Julius  II.  had  attained  his  first  end,  since  he  had 
regained  the  cities  of  the  Romagna  ;  now  he  thought  of  the 
second — the  expulsion  of  the  barbarians  from  the  penin- 
sula. He  wished,  regardless  of  his  last  alliance,  to  com- 
mence with  the  French,  whom  he  more  than  all  others  had 
contributed  to  call  into  the  peninsula  in  the  time  of  Charles 
VIII.  February  2,  1510,  he  accorded  absolution  to  the 
republic  of  Venice  ;  then  he  had  little  difficulty  in  detach- 
ing from  the  league  of  Cambrai  Ferdinand,  who  had  already 
reaped  the  fruits  which  he  expected  from  it  ;  he  unsettled 


86        CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  II. 

the  fidelity  of  Maximilian,  and  by  Mathieu  Schinner,  Car- 
dinal of  Sion,  undermined  the  Swiss,  whose  subsidies  Louis 
XII.  had  not  been  willing  to  augment.  The  Duke  of  Fer- 
rara,  ally  of  France,  and  the  city  of  Genoa  were  forthwith 
attacked,  but  without  success.  However,  Louis  XII.  hesi- 
tated to  combat  the  chief  of  Christianity.  The  clergy  of 
France  assembled  at  Tours  declared  that  the  war,  not  being 
made  against  the  Pope,  but  against  the  sovereign  of  the 
Roman  states,  was  legitimate,  and  that  his  excommunica- 
tion should  be  considered  as  null  and  void. 

In  fact  they  fought  savagely  on  both  sides.  Chaumont 
at  the  head  of  the  French  troops  furiously  surprised  the 
pontifical  army  before  Bologna,  and  the  knight  "  without 
fear  and  without  reproach  "  "  missed  laying  his  hand  on 
the  pontifical  stole  by  less  than  the  length  of  a  pater  noster." 
Attacked  like  a  prince,  Julius  II.  defended  himself  like  a 
soldier;  he  entered  Mirandola  by  the  breach  (1511),  and 
would  perhaps  have  pushed  his  successes  farther  had  not 
the  Bolognese  revolted.  They  broke  his  statue,  a  work  of 
Michael  Angelo,  to  fragments.  Obliged  to  retreat,  he  was 
beaten  at  Casalecchio,  and  returned  sick  to  Rome.  Louis 
XII.  believed  the  moment  come  to  attack  the  pontiff  and 
to  have  him  deposed.  This  was  a  fault,  because  this 
measure  changed  the  nature  of  the  fight.  Above  the 
enfeebled  temporal  prince  existed  the  spiritual  prince,  all- 
powerful.  Julius  II.  put  the  city  of  Pisa  under  interdict, 
excommunicated  the  dissenting  cardinals,  assembled  another 
council  at  St.  John  Lateran,  and  invoked  the  support  of  the 
Catholic  powers.  All  responded.  Ferdinand  of  Spain,  the 
King  of  England,  Henry  VIII.,  Maximilian,  the  republic 
of  Venice,  and  the  Swiss,  flattered  by  the  name  of  "de- 
fenders of  the  Holy  See,"  formed  the  Holy  League  (Octo- 
ber 5,  1511)  with  the  avowed  purpose  of  preserving  the 
Church  from  a  schism,  but  in  reality  to  drive  the  French 
beyond  the  Alps. 

The  Spaniard  Raymond  de  Cardona  with  12,000  men 
joined  the  pontifical  troops.  The  Venetians,  thanks  to  this 
diversion,  regained  little  by  little  their  lost  places  ;  10,000 
Swiss,  led  by  Mathieu  Schinner,  descended  from  their 
mountains  ;  treason  undermined  both  the  troops  and  the 
German  garrisons  still  in  the  service  of  Louis  XII.  in  Italy, 
while  even  the  frontiers  of  France  were  menaced  on  the 
north,  east,  and  south.  A  young  and  heroic  general  for  a 


CHAP.  VII.]  ITALIAN   WARS  (1494-1516).  87 

moment  averted  every  danger.  Gaston  de  Foix,  Duke  of 
Nemours,  twenty-two  years  old,  took  command  of  the  army 
of  Italy.  With  iron  and  silver  in  his  hand  he  first  crowded 
back  the  Swiss  into  thqir  mountains  (December,  1511). 
Bologna  was  hard  pressed  by  the  troops  of  Spain  and  the 
Holy  See  ;  he  threw  himself  into  the  city  (February  7, 
1512)  and  raised  the  siege.  The  Germans  had  surrendered 
Brescia  to  the  Venetians  ;  he  arrived  unexpectedly  under 
its  walls  and  carried  it  by  assault  (February  19).  Finally, 
(April  n),  he  defeated  the  Spanish  army  at  Ravenna,  but 
"this  thunderbolt  of  war"  fell  and  died  in  the  midst  of  his 
triumph.  He  was  succeeded,  but  not  replaced,  by  La 
Palisse.  The  French  army,  badly  conducted,  recoiled 
before  Raymond  de  Cardona,  let  Bologna  be  retaken,  and 
found  in  its  rear  20,000  Swiss,  who  fought  to  re-establish  a 
son  of  Ludovico  il  Moro,  Maximilian  Sforza,  in  the  duchy 
of  Milan.  La  Palisse  did  not  wait  for  them,  and  retired 
into  Piedmont.  Meanwhile  Julius  II.  died  (February  21, 
1513).  His  last  gaze  had  beheld  the  French  fleeing.  His 
successor,  Leo  X.,  continued  his  designs.  At  Malines  he 
formed  anew  the  Holy  League,  which,  however,  the  Vene- 
tians abandoned  through  predisposition  for  Louis  XII.,  and 
the  invasion  of  French  territory  was  resolved  upon. 

Louis  XII.  made  head  against  the  storm.  Attacked  even 
in  his  kingdom,  he  did  not  abandon  Italy.  In  spite  of 
Ferdinand,  who,  already  master  of  Spanish  Navarre,  menaced 
French  Navarre,  and  of  the  English,  who  had  disembarked 
at  Calais,  he  sent  La  Tremoille  and  Trivulcio  into  Italy. 
First  they  crowded  the  Swiss  and  Maximilian  Sforza  into 
Novara,  but  powerful  re-enforcements  entered  the  city  by 
night.  In  the  morning  the  Swiss  made  a  sortie  with  fixed 
pikes,  marched  straight  against  the  French  artillery,  made 
themselves  master  of  it  despite  the  ravages  it  caused  in  their 
ranks,  and  after  a  desperate  conflict  put  to  rout  the  besieg- 
ing army  (June  5).  On  the  north  near  Guinegate  a  panic 
seized  the  French  army  when  fighting  with  the  English, 
whom  Maximilian  had  come  to  join.  Bayard,  sacrificing  him- 
self to  arrest  the  enemy,  was  made  prisoner  ;  the  rest  fought 
only  with  their  spurs,  hence  the  name  of  the  day — Battle  of 
Spurs  (August  16).  Finally,  20,000  Swiss  penetrated  as  far 
as  Dijon,  where  La  Tremoille  arrested  them  by  means  of 
much  money  and  more  promises  (September  13).  The  only 
ally  of  France,  James  IV.,  the  King  of  Scotland,  shared  her 


88        CONSEQUENCES  OF   THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  II. 

evil  fortune  ;  he  was  conquered  and  slain  at  Floclden  by 
the  English  (September  9). 

The  triple  invasion  which  France  had  just  undergone 
forced  Louis  XII.  to  retreat.  The  Convention  of  Dijon  had 
already  disembarrassed  France  of  the  Swiss.  Louis  dis- 
avowed the  Council  of  Pisa  in  order  to  regain  the  Pope,  and 
formed  the  truce  of  Orleans  with  the  emperor  and  the  King 
of  Aragon  (March,  1514). 

Henry  VIII.  for  some  time  refused  to  lay  down  arms  ; 
but  peace  was  established  on  his  side  also  by  the  treaty  of 
London,  which  left  him  Tournay  and  assured  him  an  annual 
pension  of  100,000  crowns  for  ten  years.  It  was  sealed  by 
the  marriage  of  Louis  XII.  with  Mary,  sister  of  the  King  of 
England  ;  but  he  did  not  long  survive  this  peace  and  union  : 
he  died  (January  i,  1515),  at  the  age  of  fifty-three. 

At  the  end  of  these  twenty  years  of  battle  there  remained 

therefore,  as  says  Comines,  no  other  reminder  of  the  French 

New  con  uest   *n  Ita\y  than  the  tombs  they  had  left  there. 

of  the  Miianias   The  impetuous  pontiff,  who  had  taken  as  his 

Osi5)FranCiS  l'  device>  "  No  more  French  this  side  the  moun- 
tains," had  died  thinking  his  task  accom- 
plished." But  the  Spaniards  ruled  at  Naples,  the  Austrians 
in  Friuliand  Vicentino,  the  Swiss  in  the  Milanais.  France, 
and  especially  its  new  king,  had  no  desire  to  accept  the 
inferior  situation  wherein  she  was  placed  by  the  last 
treaties. 

While  to  Julius  II.  succeeded  Leo  X.,  amiable  and 
brilliant,  protector  of  letters  and  arts,  in  France  Francis  I. 
replaced  Louis  XII.  Young,  ardent,  eager  for  glory,  the 
new  prince  broke  the  truce  of  Orleans  and  undertook  to 
recover  the  Milanais.  The  Venetians,  his  allies,  held  in 
check  the  Austro-Spanish  troops  of  Ferdinand  the  Catholic 
and  of  the  emperor  Maximilian  ;  he  had  therefore  to  fight 
only  the  Swiss,  sole  support  of  the  duke  Maximilian 
Sforza.  While  deceived  by  false  demonstrations  the  Swiss 
hastened  to  Mt.  Cenis  and  to  Mt.  Genevra  to  guard 
the  mountain  passes,  these  defenses  were  turned  by  the 
French  army,  which  passed  by  the  Neck  of  Argentiere.  It 
was  necessary  to  throw  bridges  over  chasms  and  to  blast 
the  crags  to  give  a  passage  to  the  seventy-two  pieces  of 
cannon  which  the  army  dragged  after  it.  Thanks  to  the 
engineer  Navarro  and  the  courage  of  the  troops,  every 
obstacle  was  surmounted.  The  general  of  the  allies, 


CHAP.  VII.]  ITALIAN    WARS  (1494-1516).  89 

Prosper  Colonna,  surprised  at  table  in  Villafranca,  was 
captured  with  700  horsemen,  and  the  king  entered  the 
Milanais  with  35,000  combatants.  He  took  his  position 
near  the  little  village  of  Marignano.  Excited  by  the  Car- 
dinal of  Sion,  Mathieu  Schinner,  the  Swiss,  30,000  strong, 
advanced  along  the  causeway  of  Marignano  in  a  solid 
column,  and,  according  to  their  custom,  marched  straight 
against  the  artillery.  The  king  threw  himself  in  front  with 
his  nobility  and  his  men  of  arms,  but  the  space  was  narrow — 
not  more  than  500  horse  could  engage  at  once — and  more 
than  thirty  successive  charges  were  unable  to  break  or  to 
demoralize  the  enemy.  In  the  morning  at  daybreak  the 
combat  recommenced,  but  the  Duke  of  Bourbon  had  well 
employed  the  night.  The  Swiss,  assailed  on  their  flanks 
by  the  cavalry,  and  their  van  crushed  by  formidable  artil- 
lery, were  beginning  to  hesitate,  when  the  appearance  on 
their  rear  of  the  Venetian  advance  guard  finally  decided 
them  to  retreat  upon  Milan.  They  lost  12,000  men,  the 
honor  of  the  field  of  battle,  and,  more  important  still,  their 
reputation  as  invincible.  Trivulcio,  who  had  taken  part 
in  seventeen  pitched  battles,  called  that  of  Marignano  a 
combat  of  giants  (September  13  and  14,  1515). 

This  battle  was  not  less  important  for  its  political  results  : 
the  Duke  of  Milan  ceded  his  rights  for  a  pension  ;  the 
Pope  restored  Parma  and  Piacenza  by  the  agreement  of 
Viterbo,  in  which  the  Spaniards  were  included  ;  finally,  an 
advantageous  peace  closed  Italy  to  the  Swiss.  By  the 
treaty  of  Freiburg  the  Helvetic  Confederation  agreed  in 
return  for  an  annual  pension  of  700,000  crowns  to  allow  the 
king  to  levy  in  Switzerland  whatever  troops  he  might  need. 
This  peace,  called  perpetual,  lasted  as  long  as  the  old 
French  monarchy. 

Another  treaty,  which  concerned  only  France,  was  signed 
with  Leo  X.  This  was  the  concordat  of  1516,  which  re- 
placed the  pragmatic  sanction  of  1438.  The  concordat 
abolished  appeals  to  the  court  of  Rome,  source  of  numer- 
ous abuses  ;  also  "  reservations  and  promises  of  survivor- 
ships," by  which  the  Holy  See  exercised  the  nomination 
to  a  crowd  of  benefices,  and  conferred  upon  the  king  the 
right  of  nominating  directly  to  all  ecclesiastical  positions, 
Rome  reserving  to  itself  only  that  of  refusing  investiture 
in  case  of  canonical  disability.  Francis  renounced  only  the 
periodical  convocation  of  councils,  and  re-established  the 


90  CONSEQUENCES  OF    THE  REVOLUTION. 

impost  of  the  annates,  or  one  year's  revenue,  which  every 
new  beneficiary  was  to  pay  the  Holy  See. 

So  the  first  period  of  the  Italian  wars  terminated  to  the 
apparent  advantage  of  France.  She  had  gained  the 
duchy  of  Milan,  from  which  she  was  separated  by  the  vast 
width  of  the  Alps  and  the  dominions  of  the  house  of 
Savoy.  Her  king  could  place  one  more  crown  upon  his 
head,  but  in  return  she  was  to  wage  a  terrible  war  for  forty 
years. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

THE     FIRST     PERIOD     OF    RIVALRY     BETWEEN      THE 
HOUSES   OF  FRANCE   AND   AUSTRIA   (1519-29). 


Francis   I.  and  Charles   V. — First  War  (1521-25). — Second  War  (1526- 
29). — Treaty  of  Cambrai. 


THE  very  year  when  Francis    I.  reaped  the   fruits    of 

his    victory    at    Marignano   and   believed    he  had    estab- 

,   lished  the  pacification  of  Italy  as  well  as  the 

Francis  I.  and  '  J 

Charles  v.  grandeur  of  r  ranee  by  signing  the  "  perpetual 
First  war  (1521-  peace  "  and  the  concordat,  the  death  of  the 
King  of  Aragon,  Ferdinand  the  Catholic,  gave 
Naples  and  half  of  Spain  to  him  who  was  shortly  to  become 
Charles  V.  (1516).  This  prince,  great-grandson  of  the 
"  Grand  Duke  of  the  West,"  a  connection  which  made  him 
sovereign  of  the  Netherlands  and  Franche  Comte  with 
claims  to  Burgundy,  was  on  his  father's  side  grandson  of 
the  emperor  Maximilian  and  heir  of  Austria,  on  his 
mother's  side  grandson  of  Ferdinand  the  Catholic 
and  Isabella  with  right  of  succession  to  the  crowns  of 
Castile,  Aragon,  Navarre,  and  Naples.  Francis  I.  did  not 
seek  to  hinder  him  from  gathering  this  magnificent  herit- 
age. He  even  signed  with  him  at  Noyou  a  treaty  of 
alliance  without  demanding  anything  more  than  the  restitu- 
tion of  Navarre  to  the  d'Albret  family.  Charles  promised, 
but  with  the  firm  resolution  not  to  keep  his  word. 

Three  years  after  the  empire  became  vacant  by  the 
death  of  Maximilian  (1519).  Charles  and  Francis  I.  dis- 
puted this  crown.  The  electors  in  the  presence  of  two  so 
powerful  competitors  wished  neither  the  one  nor  the  other, 
although  they  would  have  sold  themselves  at  a  high  price 
to  both,  and  chose  Frederick  the  Wise,  elector  of  Saxony  ; 
but  he  refused,  and  advised  the  princes  to  elect  Charles  of 
Austria,  more  interested  than  anybody  else  on  account  of 
his  hereditary  estates  in  defending  Germany  against  the 


9^        CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  II. 

Ottomans.  Moreover,  they  feared  the  despotism  of  the 
King  of  France.  Charles  was  proclaimed  emperor.  His 
representatives  had  promised  that  he  would  make  neither 
peace  nor  war  nor  put  any  state  under  the  ban  of  the 
empire  without  the  consent  of  the  diet  ;  that  he  would 
give  all  the  offices  to  Germans,  and  would  fix  his  residence 
in  Germany. 

In  addition  to  his  resentment  at  this  check  Francis  I. 
had  more  than  one  serious  reason  for  combating  the  new 
Caesar.  If  it  is  doubtful  in  fact  whether  Charles  V.  ever 
aspired  to  universal  monarchy,  at  least  it  is  certain  that  one 
might  fear  it,  and  surely  he  put  in  peril  the  European 
equilibrium,  he  who  had  just  united  under  his  scepter  the 
Netherlands,  Austria,  the  kingdom  of  the  two  Sicilies, 
Spain,  the  New  World,  and  finally  the  empire.  What  was 
wanting  to  the  ambitious  man  who  had  taken  as  his  device, 
"  Always  farther  "  (Plus  oultre],  to  become  a  Charlemagne  ? 
France.  It  was  the  destiny  of  France  to  resist  this  menacing 
ambition,  and  hers  was  the  honor  of  defending  against  the 
house  of  Austria  the  independence  of  the  European  states, 
and  in  consequence  the  civilization  of  the  world. 

In  this  struggle,  which  was  to  last  two  centuries,  the 
inequality  of  forces  was  more  apparent  than  real.  The 
house  of  Austria  had  vaster  domains ;  but  they  were 
scattered,  separated  by  seas,  by  hostile  or  foreign  states. 
France  was  compact,  nothing  in  her  created  an  obstacle  to 
the  will  of  the  sovereign  ;  the  concordat  had  just  placed 
the  clergy  under  his  hand  ;  the  nobles  and  the  third  estate 
were  in  the  same  condition  long  before.  Francis  I. 
boasted  of  having  freed  the  kings  from  tutelage,  and,  first 
of  French  kings,  signed  his  ordinances  with  this  formula  : 
"  For  such  is  my  good  pleasure."  Charles  V.  had  to 
struggle  against  internal  resistances  and  embarrassments  of 
every  sort.  Nowhere  were  his  movements  free  ;  in  Spain 
there  was  the  opposition  of  the  communeros  and  the  privi- 
leges of  the  provinces  ;  in  Flanders,  the  turbulence  of  the 
citizens ;  in  Germany,  the  Protestants  ;  in  Austria,  the 
Ottomans  ;  on  the  Mediterranean,  the  pirates  of  Barbary. 
America  did  not  yet  pour  out  for  him  its  treasures,  while 
Francis  I.  drew  at  will  from  the  purse  of  his  subjects. 
Thus  is  explained  the  victorious  resistance  of  Francis  I., 
notwithstanding  the  superiority  in  talents  possessed  by  the 
emperor. 


CHAP.  VIII. j     RIVALRY  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA.        93 

The  two  rivals  first  sought  allies.  There,  as  in  pursuit 
of  the  imperial  crown,  Charles  V.  was  victor.  While 
Francis  I.  in  the  interview  of  the  Field  of  the  Cloth  of 
Gold  succeeded  in  wounding  only  the  self-love  of  Henry 
VIII.,  eclipsing  him  by  his  elegant  luxury  and  his  chivalric 
graces,  Charles  addressed  himself  to  Wolsey,  the  all-power- 
ful minister  of  the  King  of  England,  promised  him  the 
tiara,  and  made  certain  of  the  English  alliance  for  him- 
self. Leo  X.  likewise  declared  for  the  emperor,  being 
terrified  by  the  progress  of  the  Reformation  which  he  had 
before  too  much  despised.  Beaten  in  diplomacy  Francis 
hoped  better  results  from  war.  First  he  made  it  indirectly. 
He  gave  to  Henry  d'Albret  6000  men  to  invade  Navarre, 
which  Charles  V.  retained  contrary  to  the  stipulations  of 
the  treaty  of  Noyon  ;  he  furnished  other  troops  to  the 
Duke  of  Bouillon,  who  had  suffered  injuries  from  the 
emperor,  and  in  his  own  name  attacked  Luxemburg.  But 
the  French  were  beaten  in  Castile,  where  they  arrived  too 
late  to  assist  the  revolted  communeros  and  their  heroic 
chief  Don  Juan  de  Paclilla.  The  Duke  of  Bouillon  was 
equally  unsuccessful,  and  the  Imperialists  laid  siege  to 
Mezieres.  Fortunately  Bayard  threw  himself  into  the 
place,  defended  it  six  weeks,  and  gave  the  king  time  to 
come  up  with  his  army.  The  enemy  drew  back  in  disorder 
and  the  French  avenged  themselves  by  invading  the  Neth- 
erlands (1521).  But  in  Italy  Lautrec,  who  had  irritated 
the  populace  by  a  harsh  and  rapacious  government,  was 
obliged  to  abandon  Parma,  Piacenza,  and  even  Milan.  To 
provide  for  the  expenses  of  this  campaign  there  were  in- 
troduced for  the  first  time  obligations  upon  the  city  hall, 
origin  of  the  public  debt  in  France.  The  king,  making 
money  out  of  everything,  had  also  sold  twenty  counselors' 
seats  in  the  parliament  of  Paris,  and  had  melted  a  silver 
railing  which  Louis  XI.  had  given  to  St.  Martin  of 
Tours. 

The  following  year  (1522)  the  heavier  part  of  the  war 
took  place  in  Italy.  Lautrec  had  received  re-enforcements, 
but  no  money  ;  Louise  of  Savoy,  jealous  of  the  Countess 
of  Chateaubriand,  sister  of  Lautrec,  who  was  the  king's 
favorite,  had,  according  to  a  scarcely  credible  tradition, 
ompelled  the  superintendent  Semblancay  to  give  to  her 
the  money  designed  for  the  Swiss.  The  latter,  being  with- 
out pay,  mutinied  and  demanded  of  Lautrec  money,  dis- 


94        CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.    [BOOK  II. 

charge,  or  battle.  He  led  them  to  the  attack  against  the 
formidable  intrenchments  of  Becocca,  which  he  could  have 
carried  by  famine,  and  he  was  beaten.  This  defeat  brought 
about  the  loss  of  the  Milanais,  where  a  son  of  Ludovico  il 
Moro  was  re-established,  and  the  defection  of  Venice  and 
Genoa  (1522).  The  same  year  Charles  V.  had  caused  his 
former  tutor,  Adrian  VI.,  to  ascend  the  pontifical  throne. 
Italy  was  at  his  discretion. 

Francis  I.  believed  he  could  repair  everything  by  his 
presence,  and  was  making  ready  to  cross  the  Alps  with 
25,000  men  when  even  the  existence  of  the  kingdom  was 
menaced  by  the  treason  of  the  Constable  of  Bourbon.  He 
was  the  last  of  the  great  feudal  lords,  the  most  powerful 
prince  of  the  kingdom,  the  best  general  of  Francis  I.  A 
flagrant  injustice,  which  the  king  through  tenderness  for 
his  mother,  Louise  of  Savoy,  allowed  her  to  commit,  inspired 
in  the  constable  the  culpable  design  of  revenging  himself 
upon  the  king  by  betraying  France.  A  secret  agreement 
with  Charles  V.  stipulated  the  dismemberment  of  the  king- 
dom to  the  profit  of  the  emperor,  the  King  of  England, 
and  the  constable  ;  the  ancient  kingdom  of  Aries  was  to  be 
re-established  in  favor  of  the  latter.  Francis  I.,  receiving  a 
vague  warning,  sought  the  constable  at  Moulins,  hoping  to 
draw  from  him  a  confession,  a  mark  of  repentance,  at  least 
a  word  of  affection  and  devotion.  Bourbon  remained 
impenetrable  and  cold,  but  believed  himself  discovered  and 
fled.  Instead  of  leading  an  army  to  Charles  V.  he  brought 
him  only  the  sword  of  a  proscript.  Henry  VIII.  had  the 
preceding  year  declared  war  against  France,  and  an  English 
army  had  just  landed  at  Calais  ;  the  Spaniards  were  attack- 
ing Bayonne  and  12,000  Imperialists  were  entering  Cham- 
pagne. Francis  did  not  dare  go  far  away.  He  sent  against 
the  English  in  Picardy  La  Tremoille,  who  held  them  in  check 
by  skillful  maneuvers,  and  then  repulsed  them  despite  the 
inferiority  of  his  forces.  Lautrec  arrested  the  Spaniards  ; 
Guise  the  Germans.  Bonnivet  was  charged  to  recover 
Italy  (1523).  This  last  choice  was  unhappy.  The  incapa- 
ble Bonnivet,  beaten  and  wounded  at  Biagrasso,  left  the 
command  to  Bayard,  who  received  a  mortal  wound  while 
covering  the  retreat.  The  constable  continuing  the  pursuit, 
found  him  lying  at  the  foot  of  a  tree  and  expressed  his 
grief  at  seeing  him  in  this  condition.  "Sir,"  he  replied, 
"it  is  not  I  who  am  to  be  pitied,  for  I  die  an  honorable 


CHAP.  VIII.]     RIVALRY  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA.        95 

man.  But  I  pity  you  who  are  serving  against  your  prince, 
your  country,  and  your  oath  "  (1524). 

After  this  sad  success  Bourbon  invaded  Provence,  but 
Charles  V.,  distrustful  of  the  traitor,  had  given  the  chief 
command  of  the  expedition  to  Pescara.  None  of  the  prom- 
ises of  the  constable  were  realized.  He  counted  upon  his 
former  vassals  ;  not  one  stirred.  He  had  believed  that  the 
citizens  of  Marseilles  would  come  with  ropes  around  their 
necks  to  bring  the  keys  of  their  city  ;  they  made  a  vigorous 
resistance.  Francis  I.  arrived  at  the  head  of  a  formidable 
army.  The  Imperialists  were  worsted  and  fell  back  in  dis- 
order (August),  stopping  neither  behind  the  Alps  nor  under 
the  walls  of  Milan  ;  Pescara  could  throw  only  6000  men 
into  Pavia  and  fortify  himself  behind  the  Adda,  while 
Bourbon  sought  re-enforcements  on  every  side. 

Francis  followed,  and  captured  Milan  without  striking  a 
blow.  Pavia  resisted  :  he  besieged  it  ;  yet  he  believed 
himself  strong  enough  to  detach  10,000  men  from  the  army 
against  Naples.  The  enemy  had  time  to  take  breath  ; 
Bourbon,  animated  by  hatred,  found  resources  which  they 
did  not  suspect.  By  every  possible  means  he  collected 
money,  went  to  Germany,  and  after  a  few  weeks  brought 
back  12,000  lansquenets,  or  German  foot  soldiers.  Then  he 
rallied  Pescara  and  Lannoy,  the  Viceroy  of  Naples,  and  the 
three  returned  toward  Pavia,  putting  Francis  I.  between 
them  and  the  city,  where  the  veteran  captain  Antonio  de 
Leyva,  a  resolute  soldier,  commanded.  Francis  was  advised 
to  choose  a  stronger  position  ;  Bonnivet  cried  that  a  French 
king  never  retreated.  They  accepted  battle.  The  enemy 
to  form  his  line  was  compelled  to  endure  a  terrible  fire 
from  the  French  redoubts.  The  grand  master  of  artillery 
Genouillac,  "  made  successive  breaches  in  the  enemy's 
battalions,  so  that  nothing  could  be  seen  but  arms  and 
heads  flying  about."  The  soldier  king  rendered  this 
artillery  useless  by  taking  his  stand  in  front  of  it  that  he 
might  rush  upon  the  Spaniards  with  his  guards.  Then  the 
Spaniards  reformed  their  lines  ;  the  garrison  made  a  sortie 
and  everything  was  lost ;  the  Swiss  gave  way,  the  lans- 
quenets were  annihilated  ;  Francis  I.  slew  seven  enemies 
with  his  own  hand,  but  was  forced  to  surrender.  All  the 
gentlemen  who  had  charged  with  him  were  captured  or 
slain  (1525).  "In  order  that  you  may  know,"  wrote  he 
that  evening  to  his  mother,  "what  is  my  misfortune,  nothing 


96        CONSEQUENCES  OF   THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  II. 

in  the  world  is  left  me  save  my  honor  and  my  life."  From 
this  heroic  saying  has  been  derived,  "  All  is  lost  save  honor  " 
(February  24,  1525). 

Europe  was  moved  at  the  news  of  this  great  disaster  and 
trembled  for  herself,  believing  France  captured  with  her 
king.  Italy  saw  clearly  that  the  Spanish  victory  was  her 
ruin.  Wolsey,  counting  no  longer  upon  the  emperor,  who 
had  just  seated  a  new  Pope,  Clement  VII.,  upon  the  papal 
throne,  avenged  himself  for  having  been  his  dupe  by 
counseling  his  king  to  abandon  the  Austrian  alliance. 
Louise  of  Savoy,  the  Regent  of  France,  skillfully  took 
advantage  of  these  resentments.  She  even  formed 
relations  with  Souleiman,  the  Sultan  of  the  Ottomans. 
These  negotiations  had  then  no  other  effect  than  to  free 
the  French  domiciled  in  Turkey  from  the  tribute  which 
every  Christian  paid  who  wished  to  enjoy  the  free  exercise 
of  his  religion.  But  later  will  be  derived  from  them  im- 
portant consequences. 

However,  Francis  I.  did  not  find  Charles  V.  at  Madrid 
as  magnanimous  as  he  had  believed  him.  The  emperor 
had  him  carefully  watched  and  for  a  long  time  refused  to 
see  him.  Sick  with  chagrin,  Francis  had  for  a  moment  the 
design  of  abdicating  in  favor  of  his  son,  so  there  should 
be  left  in  the  hands  of  his  enemy  only  a  brave  knight 
instead  of  the  King  of  France.  This  good  resolution  did 
not  last.  He  consented  to  sign  a  disastrous  treaty  (1526), 
after  having  secretly  protested  against  a  moral  violence 
which  according  to  him  rendered  null  all  the  acts  of  the 
captive.  He  ceded  to  Charles  the  province  of  Burgundy 
under  the  limitations  of  homage,  renounced  his  claims  to 
Naples,  Genoa,  to  the  suzerainty  of  Flanders  and  Artois, 
reinstated  Bourbon  in  his  possessions,  and  promised  to 
espouse  the  sister  of  the  emperor,  the  Queen  Dowager  of 
Portugal. 

Restored  to  liberty,  Francis  I.   refused  to  execute  the 

treaty  of  Madrid  :  the  deputies  of  Burgundy  declared   in 

the  assembly  of  Cognac  that  the  king  had  no 

The     second         .    .  ,/  .  ,    ,,        ? .         , 

war  (1526-29).  right  to  alienate  a  province  of  the  kingdom 
braiaty  °fCam"  whose  integrity  he  had  sworn  at  his  corona- 
tion to  maintain.  The  emperor  accused 
Francis  of  not  keeping  his  word;  the  king  replied  that  he 
had  "  lied  in  his  throat,"  and  offered  to  settle  their  dispute 
in  single  fight.  The  war  recommenced.  The  Italians, 


CHAP.  VIII.]     RIVALRY  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA.        9? 

horribly  oppressed  by  the  Imperialists,  rushed  to  the  war 
with  enthusiasm.  "  This  time,"  said  Ghiberti,  minister  of 
Pope  Clement  VII.,  "  the  question  is  not  about  some  small 
revenge  ;  this  war  is  going  to  decide  the  deliverance  or 
enslavement  of  Italy."  "  If  Italy,"  said  another,  "  makes 
alliance  with  Francis  I.  it  is  for  her  advantage  and  not  be- 
cause she  loves  the  French."  Henry  VIII.  of  England 
had  taken  the  title  of  Protector  of  the  League.  The  Pope, 
Venice,  Florence,  Milan,  and  the  Swiss  were  members. 

But  as  in  every  coalition  the  league  of  Italian  independ- 
ence was  deficient  in  concert  and  energy.  Its  general,  the 
Duke  of  Urbino,  let  Sforza  succumb  in  Milan.  Instead  of 
supporting  the  pontifical  fleet  which  menaced  Genoa,  he 
amused  himself  by  capturing  Cremona.  He  dissembled 
his  terrors  by  comparing  himself  to  Fabius  Cunctator. 
During  these  fatal  days  Bourbon  received  re-enforcements. 
There  came  to  him  from  Germany  ten  to  fifteen  thousand 
lansquenets,  fanatic  Lutherans,  commanded  by  George 
Frondsberg.  After  having  ravaged  the  Milanais  they 
wished  another  prey,  Florence  or  Rome — Rome  especially, 
the  "  sacrilegious  Babylon."  Frondsberg  wore  at  his  neck 
a  gold  chain  with  which  he  swore  to  strangle  the  Pope.  It 
was  not  displeasing  to  Charles  V.  that  Italy  should  receive 
a  severe  lesson  ;  he  left  Bourbon  without  money  and  with- 
out orders.  Then  those  famished  bands,  henceforth  listen- 
ing to  nothing,  slaying  their  officers  and  menacing  the 
constable  himself,  crossed  the  Apennines  ;  the  Italian  army 
was  contented  with  covering  Tuscany.  Bourbon  marched 
upon  Rome,  dreaming  perhaps  of  great  designs,  an  Italian 
kingdom  equally  independent  of  Spain  and  France.  Rome 
had  closed  its  gates.  He  ordered  the  assault,  and  was  one 
of  the  first  to  fall,  but  his  soldiers  avenged  him  cruelly.  In 
less  than  an  hour  the  city  was  captured  (May  6);  the  pillage 
lasted  nine  months,  and  the  brigands  were  stopped  only  by 
a  frightful  pestilence  which  decimated  their  numbers.  In 
the  time  of  the  Goths  and  Vandals  Rome  had  suffered 
nothing  more  terrible.  The  convents  were  forced,  the 
altars  stripped,  the  tombs  profaned,  the  library  of  the 
Vatican  sacked,  the  masterpieces  of  Michael  Angelo  torn 
down  as  monuments  of  idolatry. 

In  all  Christendom  there  was  only  one  cry  against  these 
new  barbarians.  Francis  I.,  slow,  contrary  to  his  habit,  in 
acting,  finally  sent  a  powerful  army  into  Italy.  Lautrec, 


98  CONSEQUENCES  OF    THE  REVOLUTION. 

who  commanded  it,  reconquered  the  Milanais  and  besieged 
Naples  by  land  while  Doria  blockaded  it  by  sea.  All  was 
over  with  the  Spanish  power  in  Italy,  had  not  the  king 
committed  a  mistake.  Distrustful  of  Genoa,  he  wished  by 
making  of  Savona  a  great  port  to  give  her  a  rival  whom  he 
could  easily  control.  Andrew  Doria,  Genoese  above  all, 
made  remonstrances,  and,  as  they  were  not  listened  to,  he 
passed  with  his  fleet  to  the  side  of  the  emperor.  The  sea 
becoming  free,  Naples  was  revictualed  ;  the  army  of 
Lautrec  in  its  turn  suffered  from  famine  ;  he  himself  yielded 
to  the  pest,  and  the  remnants  of  his  troops  capitulated  in 
Aversa  (1528).  Another  French  army,  commanded  by  the 
Count  of  St.  Pol,  was  destroyed  the  following  year  at 
Landriano,  and  the  peninsula  lost  to  the  French.  Since 
that  day  it  has  remained  under  the  power  or  the  influence 
of  the  house  of  Austria,  which  France  has  twice  made 
recoil,  at  Rivoli  and  at  Solferino,  and  which  has  now  com- 
pletely departed  from  Italy. 

The  emperor  came  himself  to  reap  the  fruits  of  his  gen- 
erals' victories  and  of  his  rival's  faults.  He  betook  himself 
to  Bologna,  summoned  thither  Clement  VII.  and  dictated 
his  conditions.  Venice  restored  what  it  had  taken  ;  the 
dukes  of  Ferrara  and  Milan  acknowledged  themselves 
vassals  of  the  empire,  likewise  did  the  Marquis  of  Mantua, 
who  was  created  a  duke  ;  Savoy  and  Montferrat  renounced 
the  French  alliance.  That  done,  Clement  VII.  placed  the 
two  crowns  of  Italy  and  of  the  empire  upon  the  forehead 
of  Charles  V.  (1530).  Florence  alone  protested  against 
this  subjection  of.  Italy.  Defended  a  whole  year  by 
Michael  Angelo,  she  was  obliged  at  last  to  open  her  gates 
to  the  Imperialists  ;  they  re-established  the  Medici,  who 
henceforth  reigned  there  for  the  benefit  of  Spain. 

Charles  V.  was  now  apparently  ready  to  attack  France. 
But  peace  with  Francis  I.  was  necessary,  since  a  religious 
war  was  on  the  point  of  breaking  out  in  Germany  ;  Sou- 
lei'man  was  pressing  his  redoubtable  Janissaries  even  to 
the  walls  of  Vienna,  and  Henry  VIII.  threatened  to  break 
the  Austrian  alliance.  The  treaty  of  Cambrai  was  less 
harsh  than  that  of  Madrid,  since  the  emperor  renounced 
his  claims  to  Burgundy,  but  it  was  just  as  humiliating,  since 
the  King  of  France  betrayed  his  Italian  allies,  abandoned 
his  pretensions  to  Naples,  recognized  Sforza  as  Duke  of 
Milan,  and  ceded  Tournay  and  Hesdin  together  with  his 
suzerainty  over  Flanders  and  Artois  (1529). 


CHAPTER  IX. 

THE  SECOND  PERIOD  OF  RIVALRY  BETWEEN  THE 
HOUSES  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA.— INTERVEN- 
TION OF  TURKEY  AND  ENGLAND  (1529-47). 


New  System  of  French  Alliances. — Charles  V.  before  Tunis  and  Algiers. 
—Third  War  with  France  (1536-38). — Fourth  War  (1542-44). 


THE  rivalry  of  the  French  and  Burgundian  houses,  begun 
at  the  bridge  of  Montereau  in  1419  by  the  assassination  of 
John  the  Fearless,  had  under  Charles  VI., 
ofNFreac]?*aiii>-  Charles  VII.,  and  Louis  XL,  brought  great 
ances-  perils  to  the  kingdom.  These  were  ended 

by  the  death  of  Charles  the  Bold.  But  upon  the  broken 
trunk  of  the  Burgundian  house  was  grafted  a  new 
dynasty,  the  Austro-Spanish.  So  long  as  it  was  divided 
and  represented  by  children,  the  French  kings  could  ven- 
ture upon  the  brilliant  but  dangerous  and  useless  career  of 
foreign  conquest ;  this  was  the  period  of  the  first  Italian 
expedition  (1494-1516).  When  the  dynasty  was  reunited 
in  the  hands  of  a  prudent  and  sagacious  man  who  wished 
to  become  a  second  Charlemagne  a  new  conflict  opened. 
The  first  had  brought  France  Burgundy  ;  the  second  cost 
France  the  title  of  suzerain  over  Flanders  and  Artois,  and 
shut  against  it  Italy,  dominated  by  the  house  of  Austria. 
From  that  time  the  kingdom  was  inclosed  throughout  the 
whole  length  of  its  land  frontier  from  the  Adour  to  the 
Somme  by  a  circle  of  hostile  possessions,  including  Spain, 
Italy,  Franche  Comte,  Germany,  and  the  Netherlands,  all 
united  in  the  hands  of  the  emperor.  To  break  this  men- 
acing circle  the  sword  of  France,  which,  moreover,  had 
been  shattered  at  Pavia,  was  not  enough  ;  it  was  neces- 
sary to  invoke  the  aid  of  all  those  whosoever  they  were 
whom  this  imperial  ambition  threatened. 

Defeat  had  rendered  Francis  I.  the  service  of  diminishing, 


100      CONSEQUENCES  OF   THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  II. 

if  not  extinguishing,  his  fatal  inclination  to  imitate  the 
prowess  of  the  ancient  knights.  He  now  comprehended 
that  a  soldier's  bravery  was  not  sufficient  to  bring  political 
affairs  to  a  good  result ;  he  sought  and  welcomed  allies 
without  regarding  the  names  they  bore  :  the  schismatic 
King  of  England,  the  Protestants  of  Germany,  even — 
what  was  then  still  more  odious — the  Ottomans.  From 
England  Francis  I.  derived  little  assistance.  Henry  VIII. 
(1509-47)  had  assumed  as  device,  "Whomsoever  I  defend 
is  master,"  promising  himself,  indeed,  to  defend  nobody  to 
the  finish.  He  could  in  fact  hold  the  balance  equal  be- 
tween the  two  powerful  rivals  who  disputed  the  supremacy 
of  Europe.  But  this  voluptuous  and  sanguinary  prince 
was  too  much  the  slave  of  his  passions  to  follow  undevi- 
atingly  a  constant  and  uniform  system.  Under  Louis  XII. 
he  had  taken  part  in  the  great  coalition  against  France. 
The  victory  at  Marignano  excited  his  envy.  After  the 
election  of  Charles  V.  he  appeared  to  incline  toward  that 
one  of  the  two  adversaries  who  wore  but  a  single  crown, 
but  at  the  interview  of  the  Field  of  the  Cloth  of  Gold 
Francis  wounded  his  vanity  and  lost  his  alliance.  In  1521 
he  signed  a  treaty  with  Charles  V.,  and  some  months  after 
declared  war  against  France.  Francis  replied  to  this 
attack  by  an  alliance  with  Scotland  and  the  Irish  rebels. 
In  1523  an  English  army  came  as  far  as  the  Oise.  After 
Pavia,  Charles  having  become  too  powerful,  Henry  VIII. 
negotiated  with  the  regents  of  France  and  caused  the  in- 
sertion in  the  treaty  of  this  peculiar  clause,  that  Louise  of 
Savoy  should  consent  to  no  dismemberment  of  France  in 
favor  of  Charles  V.  He  understood  that  the  integrity  of 
this  kingdom  guaranteed  the  independence  of  Europe. 
Francis  on  escaping  from  captivity  confirmed  the  treaty 
made  by  his  mother  ;  but  Henry,  content  with  having,  by 
alarming  Charles  V.,  drawn  Francis  I.  from  his  hands, 
returned  to  neutrality,  desiring  the  triumph  of  France  no 
more  than  that  of  Austria. 

Another  matter  at  that  moment  was  occupying  all  his 
attention,  the  question  of  divorce  from  his  first  wife,  the 
aunt  of  the  emperor.  In  1529  he  consulted  on  this  subject 
the  French  universities  ;  they  were  careful  not  to  give  an 
adverse  opinion,  and  during  several  years  Henry  drew 
nearer  France,  but  when  the  war  broke  forth  anew  he  was 
already  becoming  alienated  from  it. 


CHAP.  IX.]      RIVALRY  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA.        101 

It  was  not  so  with  the  Ottoman  alliance.  The  Ottomans 
had  as  their  sultan  the  celebrated  Souleiman  I.  As  war- 
like as  his  father,  Selim,  but  friendly  to  the  arts,  protector 
of  letters,  author  of  the  code  entitled  the  Khanounname", 
Souleiman  I.  deserved  his  triple  surname  of  Conqueror, 
Magnificent,  and  Legislator.  Before  him  the  Ottomans 
were  to  the  Christians  nothing  but  barbarians  who  came  to 
impose  an  execrated  religion  by  the  sword.  During  his 
reign  they  took  a  place  among  European  peoples  and  filled 
a  role  important  to  European  destinies.  It  was  Francis  I. 
who  introduced  the  Ottomans  to  the  politics  of  Europe. 
He  has  been  reproached  for  his  relations  with  the  enemies 
of  Christianity  as  fora  crime  and  they  seemed  to  cause  him 
to  blush.  In  reality  the  Ottoman  empire  was  less  danger- 
ous to  Europe  than  the  daily  increasing  power  and  ambi- 
tion of  the  house  of  Austria.  Besides,  although  Francis  I. 
obtained  the  Ottoman  alliance,  Charles  V.  had  sought  it. 
Finally,  religion  was  the  gainer  inasmuch  as  the  Eastern 
Christians,  as  well  as  all  the  merchants  who  sailed  under  the 
French  flag,  found  a  certain  security  in  the  protection  of  the 
French  consuls.  Religion  lost  nothing,  for  the  great  con- 
quests of  Souleiman  over  the  Christians  are  antecedent  to 
the  treaty  concluded  in  1534  with  the  King  of  France:  it 
was  in  1521  that  after  twelve  assaults  he  captured  Belgrade, 
the  bulwark  of  Hungary  ;  in  1522  that  at  the  head  of 
150,000  men  and  400  ships  he  took  Rhodes  from  the 
knights  despite  the  heroic  resistance  of  the  grand  master, 
Villiers  de  ITsle-Adam,  who  defended  himself  five  months  ; 
finally,  in  1526  that  he  made  himself  master  of  Peterwardein 
and  gained  the  great  victory  of  Mohacz.  He  had  passed 
the  Danube  with  200,000  men  and  destroyed  the  Hungarian 
army  on  that  fatal  day  when  perished  Louis  II.,  the  last  of 
the  Jagellons  of  Hungary. 

The  crown  of  Hungary  reverted  to  Ferdinand  of  Austria, 
brother-in-law  of  Louis  II.  But  against  this  brother  of 
Charles  V.,  Souleiman  supported  a  pretender  of  the  Magyar 
race,  John  Zapoli.  All  Hungary  was  ravaged  by  the  Otto- 
mans. Buda  even  fell  into  their  power  (1529).  Zapoli 
acknowledged  himself  vassal  of  the  Porte,  the  Prince  of 
Moldavia  did  the  same,  and  Souleiman,  finding  nothing  else 
to  arrest  him  on  the  Danube,  penetrated  into  Austria  and 
laid  siege  to  Vienna.  It  was  on  August  3  that  the  treaty 
of  peace  of  Cambrai  was  signed  when  the  Ottomans  were 


102      CONSEQUENCES  OF   THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  II. 

already  marching  upon  Vienna,  where  they  arrived  Septem- 
ber 26.  Comparison  of  these  two  dates  shows  why  the 
"  treaty  of  the  ladies  "  was  signed.  Vienna  was  garri- 
soned by  20,000  soldiers  who  had  made  the  Italian  cam- 
paigns, and  had  as  governor  the  valiant  Count  of  Salm. 
Twenty  assaults  were  successively  repulsed.  The  sultan 
had  to  retrace  his  steps.  He  endeavored  to  forget  this 
reverse  by  crowning  with  his  own  hands  at  Buda  his  vas- 
sal John  Zapoli  King  of  Hungary. 

Two  years  later  he  conquered  Slavonia  ;  in  1532  he  re- 
appeared in  Hungary  at  the  head  of  300,000  men.  Happily 
Guns,  a  little  fortress  of  Styria,  delayed  him  a  month. 
During  the  siege  of  that  city  he  received  the  first  embassy 
of  Francis  I.  with  extraordinary  magnificence.  He  in- 
tended to  invade  Germany,  but  Charles  V.  had  had  time  to 
assemble  150,000  combatants.  Never  since  the  crusades  had 
Christian  Europe  united  so  considerable  forces.  Lutherans 
and  Catholics  joined  hands  against  the  Crescent,  and 
Francis  I.  did  not  dare  to  support  his  redoubtable  ally  by  a 
diversion  upon  the  Rhine  or  Italy.  There  took  place,  how- 
ever, no  general  action.  At  the  end  of  six  weeks  the  sultan 
learned  that  a  Spanish  fleet  had  just  entered  the  Dardanelles 
and  was  menacing  Constantinople  ;  he  withdrew  (1532). 

Not  before  1543  did  Francis  I.  cease  to  make  a  mystery 
of  his  relations  with  Soulei'man.  That  year  was  concluded 
with  the  Porte  the  first  of  those  treaties,  known  as  capitu- 
lations, by  virtue  of  which  France  obtained  the  protectorate 
of  the  holy  places,  the  right  of  establishing  its  factories  in 
the  harbors  of  the  Levant,  and  freedom  of  commerce  for 
its  flag  alone.  Such  were  the  public  clauses  of  the  alliance. 
But  in  secret  the  sultan  promised  to  attack  Naples,  while 
the  king  should  assail  the  Milanais.  At  the  same  time  the 
king  made  overtures  to  the  Lutheran  princes  who  had  just 
formed  against  the  emperor  the  League  of  Smalkalde(i532). 

The  Pope  cherished  no  resentment  against  him  for  it ;  at 
least  his  wrath  did  not  hold  against  the  offer  which  Francis 
made  him  of  marrying  the  dauphin  to  the  niece  of  the 
pontiff,  Catherine  de  Medici.  Clement  VII.  died  almost 
immediately  after  ;  the  advantage  hoped  from  this  misalli- 
ance with  the  Florentine  bankers'  daughter  was  com- 
promised. But  the  pontifical  policy  inclined  to  the  side  of 
France  after  the  house  of  Austria  possessed  Naples  and 
coveted  Milan.  Even  at  Rome  religious  interest  was  sub- 


CHAP.  IX.]     RIVALRY  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA.      103 

ordinated  to  political  interest.  There,  moreover,  around 
the  chair  of  St.  Peter  the  two  interests  were  identical.  In 
France  by  alliance  with  the  Ottomans  the  doctrine  of 
interest  was  carried  to  the  extreme,  satisfied  by  the  saying 
of  Francis  I.  that  "  when  the  wolves  rushed  upon  his  flock 
it  was  surely  his  right  to  set  the  dogs  upon  them."  It  is  a 
truer  statement  still  that  with  the  great  modern  societies 
great  national  interests  were  born,  and  that  national  ques- 
tions now  took  precedence  of  religious  questions — proof 
that  the  Middle  Ages  were  really  dead. 

Francis  also  strengthened  his  alliance  with  the  Scots  by 
marrying  to  their  king  his  eldest  daughter  (1536),  and  on 
her  death  Mary  of  Lorraine  ;  later  he  signed  the  first 
French  treaties  with  Denmark  (1541),  thus  endeavoring  to 
form  around  France  a  coalition  of  secondary  states  so  as 
to  make  head  against  Charles,  who  aspired  to  universal 
supremacy.  At  the  same  time  he  organized  a  national 
infantry  of  42,000  men  (legions  provinciates)  in  order  to 
no  longer  be  at  the  discretion  of  Swiss  or  German  mercen- 
aries. 

While  Francis  I.  allied  himself  to  the  Lutherans  and 
infidels,  Charles  gloriously  resisted  the  latter,  and  although 
Charles  v  ^  tnus  c'omS  he  served  only  his  own  ambi- 
before  Tunis  tion  and  interest,  could  represent  himself  as 
Thid  wtrgwith  the  defender  of  Christianity.  The  Ottoman 
France  (1536-  marine  was  making  menacing  progress  under 
the  direction  of  the  celebrated  Khaireddin,  or 
Barbaroussa.  This  pirate,  become  admiral  of  the  Ottoman 
fleets,  incessantly  traversed  the  Mediterranean ;  and, 
while  in  Asia  the  sultan  was  taking  from  the  Persians  Tauris 
and  Bagdad  (1534),  which  they  recaptured  the  following 
year,  Barbaroussa  was  driving  the  Bey  of  Tunis,  Mouley 
Hassan,  from  his  kingdom.  Algiers  and  Tunis  became,  as 
formerly  Carthage  under  Genseric,  and  Biserta  under  the 
Aglabites,  the  resort  of  a  multitude  of  corsairs.  Security 
disappeared  along  all  the  coast  of  Spain  and  Italy.  Against 
these  nests  of  pirates  Charles  V.  fitted  out  two  celebrated 
expeditions.  In  the  first  with  400  ships  commanded  by 
Doria  he  captured  La  Gouletta  at  the  entrance  of  the  Gulf 
of  Tunis  and  set  free  20,000  captives  (1535)  ;  but  less 
happy  six  years  after,  at  Algiers  he  saw  his  fleet  dispersed 
by  a  tempest  and  could  hardly  save  its  remains  (1541).  The 
emperor  better  protected  the  commerce  of  Christian  nations 


104     CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  It. 

by  ceding  the  island  of  Malta  to  the  knights  of  Rhodes 
(I53°)-  This  intrepid  militia,  the  Mite  of  all  the  nobility 
of  Europe,  with  equal  success  and  devotion  acted  as  police 
of  the  Mediterranean.  It  undertook  against  the  pirates  a 
war  of  ruse  and  stratagem  in  which  they  did  not  always  have 
the  upper  hand.  However,  it  could  not  prevent  a  rival  of 
Barbaroussa,  the  corsair  Dragout,  from  making  himself 
master  of  Tripoli  in  1551.  The  Porte,  already  in  control 
of  Egypt  and  suzerain  of  the  Barbary  states,  then  found 
itself  solidly  established  upon  almost  all  the  northern  coast 
of  Africa. 

An  evil  act  of  the  emperor  broke  the  peace  of  Cambrai. 
At  the  instigation  of  Charles  V.  the  Duke  of  Milan,  violat- 
ing international  law,  seized  and  executed  in  his  dungeon 
Merveille,  a  French  envoy.  Francis  was  preparing  to  cross 
the  Alps  to  avenge  this  outrage  when  the  duke  died  (1535)  ; 
at  once  he  put  forward  his  claims  to  the  Milanais,  and  in 
order  to  facilitate  its  conquest  seized  the  states  of  the  Duke 
of  Savoy.  This  house  had  remained  constantly  faithful  to 
France  from  the  time  of  Louis  XI.,  and  had  favored  all 
French  operations  beyond  the  mountains,  which  without 
the  assistance  of  the  "  gatekeeper  of  the  Alps "  would 
have  been  difficult.  But  in  1521  the  duke  Charles  III. 
had  married  a  sister-in-law  of  Charles  V.,  and  from  that 
moment  had  shown  only  an  unstable  friendship,  which 
changed  after  Pavia  and  the  treaty  of  Cambrai  into  senti- 
ments of  hostility.  Master  of  Savoy  and  Piedmont,  which 
are  the  two  keys  of  Italy,  Francis  from  there  held  in 
check  the  Spanish  domination  in  the  peninsula.  But  he 
let  himself  be  persuaded  by  the  promises  of  Charles  V., 
who  being  by  no  means  ready  for  war,  entered  upon  perfid- 
ious negotiations  to  gain  time.  When  he  had  terminated 
these  preparations  he  threw  off  the  mask,  and  in  the  con- 
sistory of  Rome,  in  the  presence  of  all  the  ambassadors  of 
the  Christian  states,  uttered  against  his  rival  the  most  vio- 
lent menaces  and  insults  (April  5). 

Through  lack  of  money  Francis  I  was  obliged  to  hold 
himself  on  the  defensive  ;  moreover,  he  imprudently  in- 
trusted the  defense  of  Piedmont  to  the  incapable  and 
treacherous  Marquis  of  Saluzzo.  All  the  strongholds  were 
surrendered  to  the  Imperialists,  and  Charles  entered  Prov- 
ence at  the  head  of  60,000  combatants.  This  impassive 
man,  ordinarily  so  self-controlled,  was  hardly  recognizable. 


CHAP.  IX.]     RIVALRY  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA.      105 

He  flattered  himself  that  he  should  conquer  France  in  one 
campaign,  in  advance  distributed  offices  and  dignities,  and 
recommended  his  historiographer,  Paolo  Giovio,  to  provide 
himself  with  ink  and  pens,  because  he  said  he  was  going  to 
"  cut  out  work  for  him."  Montmorency,  whom  Francis 
had  charged  with  the  defense,  did  not  dare  to  risk  a 
battle  against  the  veteran  Spanish  troops.  He  made  a 
desert  of  Provence.  All  the  fortresses  except  Aries  and 
Marseilles  were  dismantled.  The  wells  were  filled  up,  the 
mills  and  barns  burned.  The  inhabitants  fled  to  the  forests 
or  the  mountains.  The  emperor  wandered  two  months  in 
the  midst  of  this  appalling  desolation.  Repulsed  before 
Marseilles,  he  captured  Aries  and  wished  there  to  be  crowned 
King  of  Provence  :  nobles,  magistrates,  priests,  all  had  fled. 
He  marched  upon  Avignon  ;  a  victory  alone  could  restore 
the  temper  of  his  troops.  Montmorency  remained  immo- 
bile despite  the  ardor  of  the  French.  The  Imperialists  then 
retreated,  harassed  by  the  peasants  and  cut  off  by  dysentery. 
Of  this  imposing  army  which  was  to  conquer  France 
Charles  led  back  only  the  remains  (September,  1536).  He 
hastened  to  quit  Italy  and  went  to  Spain  to  hide  his  humili- 
ation. 

The  Provencals  had  acted  admirably  ;  the  Picards, 
menaced  at  the  same  time  by  another  imperial  army,  did  the 
same.  At  St.  Riquier,  at  Peronne,  the  women  fought  upon 
the  ramparts  beside  the  men.  The  Normans  saw  no  enemy 
at  home,  so  they  went  to  seek  one.  Their  corsairs  gained 
200,000  gold  crowns  in  prizes  from  the  Spaniards. 

Francis  I.  opened  the  following  campaign  by  a  ridiculous 
ceremony  ;  Charles  V.  cited  to  appear  before  the  parlia- 
ment of  Paris,  was  declared  by  contumacy  guilty  of  felony 
and  deprived  of  his  fiefs  of  Artois  and  Flanders.  This  pro- 
cedure ended  only  in  an  insignificant  war  marked  by  vari- 
ous sieges.  The  two  parties,  equally  exhausted,  concluded 
a  ten  months'  truce  as  to  the  northern  frontier.  On  the 
south  Francis  I.  reconquered  Piedmont.  However,  Soulei'- 
man,  who  had  just  subdued  the  princes  of  Georgia  and 
Albania  at  the  extremities  of  his  empire,  crushed  the  Aus- 
trians  at  Essek  (1537),  while  his  admiral,  Barbaroussa,  dev- 
astated the  coasts  of  the  kingdom  of  Naples.  An  immense 
cry  of  rage  rose  in  Italy  against  the  King  of  France,  the  ally 
of  the  Ottomans.  The  Pope  made  himself  the  mouthpiece 
of  public  opinion  and  forced  the  two  rivals  to  accept  him  as 


106      CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  II. 

mediator  :  despite  their  resentments,  at  Nice  they  concluded 
a  truce  for  ten  years.  Each  of  them  kept  his  conquests. 
The  Duke  of  Savoy  was  sacrificed  (1538). 

Souleiman  could  not  be  sacrificed  so  easily.  The  two 
princes  who  disputed  Hungary,  Ferdinand  of  Austria  and 
Zapoli,  Prince  of  Transylvania,  had  divided  this  kingdom  by 
the  treaty  of  Wuitzen  (1536).  The  sultan  under  the  pre- 
tense of  defending  the  rights  of  the  son  of  Zapoli,  menaced 
by  the  Germans,  defeated  the  latter,  and  retook  Buda  and 
almost  all  Hungary  (1541).  Three  years  before  he  had 
conquered  Yemen  and  equipped  on  the  Red  Sea  a  fleet  to 
succor  the  Mussulmans  of  India  against  the  Portuguese. 
Thus  the  standards  of  the  sultan  floated  from  the  mouths 
of  the  Rhone  to  those  of  the  Indus,  and  his  power  extended 
from  the  Caucasus  to  the  African  Atlas. 

After  having  signed  the  truce  of  Nice,  Charles  V.  and 
Francis  I.  had  an  interview  at  Aigues-Mortes.  Montmor- 
ency,  a  skillful  courtier,  who  under  a  stern  exterior  con- 
cealed a  boundless  ambition  and  cupidity,  had  persuaded 
the  king  that  the  sole  means  of  acquiring  the  Milanais  was 
to  contract  a  solid  alliance  with  Charles  V.  Charles  at  no 
price  was  willing  to  cede  this  province.  But  the  friendship 
of  the  king  at  this  moment  was  for  him  a  piece  of  good  for- 
tune, for  his  troops  were  revolting  in  Italy  and  Sicily,  and 
the  cortes  of  Spain  refused  him  money.  Scarcely  was  he 
freed  from  these  embarrassments  when  there  arose  a  new 
peril.  The  powerful  city  of  Ghent  revolted  and  offered 
itself  to  France.  The  king  thought  only  of  the  Milanais, 
which  was  useless  to  him  ;  he  refused  Flanders,  which  would 
have  been  a  most  precious  acquisition.  He  did  more  : 
betraying  those  who  had  trusted  him,  he  informed  the 
emperor  of  their  propositions,  invited  him  to  pass  through 
France  in  order  to  more  quickly  chastise  the  rebels, 
and  gave  him  a  magnificent  reception.  He  believed  he 
would  obtain  the  Milanais  ;  he  gained  neither  Ghent  nor 
Milan. 

After  the  Flemings  submitted  Charles  V.  ignored  his 
promises.  "  Let  them  show  me  anything  written,"  said  he  ; 
and  he  declared  that  he  reserved  the  investiture  of  the 
Milanias  for  his  son  Philip.  The  king,  ashamed  of  having 
been  duped,  resolved  on  a  new  war.  Neither  the  oppor- 
tunity nor  the  pretexts  were  long  wanting. 

Two  secret  agents  whom  he  sent  to  Souleiman  were  assas- 


CHAP.  IX.]      RIVALRY  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA.      107 

sinated  by  del  Guasto,  Governor  of  the  Milanais  (1540). 
Del  Guasto  believed  he  would  find  on  them 

Fourth     war        ...  ...........  .. 

(1542-44).  the  formal  proof  of  the  king  s  alliance  with 

the  Ottomans.  Happily  the  dispatches  had 
remained  in  -Piedmont.  A  few  months  after  Charles  V. 
attacked  the  Algerian  pirates.  We  have  already  seen  that 
the  expedition  completely  failed  (1541). 

This  attempt  and  this  reverse  made  Francis  I.  hasten 
his  preparations.  Sure  of  James  V.  of  Scotland,  who  had 
espoused  his  oldest  daughter  in  1536,  and  on  her  death  a 
princess  of  the  house  of  Lorraine,  he  contracted  with  the 
kings,  of  Sweden  and  Denmark  the  first  alliance  which 
united  France  and  the  Scandinavian  states.  Lastly  he  set 
on  foot  five  armies  at  once  to  attack  Roussillon,  the  Nether- 
lands, and  Italy.  Success  did  not  correspond  to  so  many 
efforts.  The  campaign  of  1542  was  without  result,  but 
Francis  I.  lost  a  useful  ally.  Henry  VIII.  had  wished  to 
draw  the  King  of  Scotland  into  the  schism  ;  James  V. 
refused,  and  menaced  with  war  by  his  powerful  neighbor, 
anticipated  him  by  himself  invading  England.  Many  of 
the  Scotch  nobles  who  had  adopted  the  reform  of  Calvin 
abandoned  their  king  at  the  moment  of  action.  James  V. 
died  a  few  days  later  ;  he  left  by  Mary  of  Lorraine  a  daugh- 
ter who  had  just  been  born,  Mary  Stuart.  The  following 
year  Henry  VIII.  formed  an  offensive  alliance  with  Charles 
V.;  the  two  princes  were  to  enter  France  at  once  and  to 
divide  the  kingdom.  The  emperor  obliged  the  Duke  of 
Cleves,  ally  of  Francis  I.,  to  submit,  but  he  did  not  succeed 
in  breaking  through  the  northern  frontier,  and  he  besieged 
Landrecies  in  vain.  Meanwhile  Souleiman  attacked  the 
Austrian  dominions  on  the  east ;  he  mastered  what  had  so 
far  escaped  him  in  Hungary;  he  penetrated  into  Austria,  and 
his  fleet,  united  to  that  of  France,  bombarded  Nice.  The 
city  was  taken,  but  not  the  citadel.  The  Ottomans  wintered 
at  Toulon  (1543). 

The  following  campaign  opened  by  abrilliant  victory.  The 
French  had  invested  Carignano  ;  del  Guasto  approached 
to  save  the  city.  Officers  and  soldiers,  and  most  of  all 
d'Enghien,  their  young  chieftain,  were  eager  to  answer  the 
defiance  of  the  Spaniards.  But  a  precise  order  of  the  king 
forbade  risking  a  general  battle.  The  opportunity  appeared 
so  excellent  that  the  Duke  d'Enghien  sent  Montluc  into 
France  to  beg  permission  to  attack  the  enemy  ;  he  promised 


lo8         CONSEQUENCES  Of   THE  REVOLUTION. 

to  beat  him  well.  Meanwhile  he  kept  close  watch  of  the 
Spaniards  at  Cerisoles.  Francis  I.  could  not  resist.  Then 
was  produced  a  burst  of  enthusiasm  worthy  of  the  glorious 
days  of  Marignano.  All  the  gentlemen  wished  to  set  out  for 
the  army  and  the  court  found  itself  deserted.  They  brought 
their  courage  and  they  brought  also  money,  which  the  Duke 
d'Enghien  borrowed  to  pay  his  soldiers.  The  men-at-arms 
charged  splendidly,  but  the  battle  would  have  been  lost  with- 
out the  veteran  bands  of  the  French  and  Swiss  foot.  The 
routed  Imperialists  left  on  the  field  of  battle  12,000  dead 
and  their  cannon  and  baggage  ;  the  French  did  not  lose 
200  men  (1544). 

But  France  had  to  combat  half  of  Europe  ;  instead  of  in- 
vading the  Milanais  it  was  necessary  after  the  glorious  day  of 
Cerisoles  to  detach  from  the  army  of  Piedmont  1 2,000  chosen 
men  to  defend  Picardy  and  Champagne  ;  Henry  VIII. 
had  just  disembarked  at  Calais  and  was  besieging  Boulogne. 
Charles  V.  had  entered  Champagne  and  had  captured  St. 
Dizier.  The  Imperialists  reached  Chateau-Thierry  and 
alarm  spread  in  the  capital.  The  Parisians  commenced  to 
emigrate  with  their  goods  to  Orleans.  "  My  God,"  cried 
Francis  I.,  "  thou  art  making  me  pay  dearly  for  this  crown 
which  I  believed  I  received  from  thy  hand  as  a  gift  ! "  But 
the  hostile  camp  was  distressed  by  want  and  sickness  ;  the 
English  obstinately  remained  before  Boulogne  instead  of 
joining  their  allies.  Charles  V.,  pressed  to  prevent  the 
progress  of  the  Lutherans  in  Germany,  consented  to  treat. 

Peace  was  signed  at  Crespy.  The  emperor  and  the  king 
mutually  restored  whatever  they  had  conquered  from  each 
other  ;  Francis  continued  to  hold  Savoy  and  Piedmont  ; 
Charles  promised,  moreover,  the  investiture  of  the  Milanais 
to  a  younger  son  of  the  king,  but  this  young  prince  died. 
Henry  VIII.,  although  left  alone,  refused  to  treat.  Finally, 
he  decided  in  June,  1546,  to  lay  down  his  arms  and  restore 
Boulogne  in  consideration  of  2,000,000  francs  to  be  paid  in 
eight  years. 

Francis  I.  survived  this  last  treaty  only  a  few  months. 
He  died  March  31, 1547.  An  odious  act,  the  massacre  of  the 
Waldenses,  had  tarnished  his  last  years.  His  son,  Henry 
II.,  succeeded. 


CHAPTER  X. 

THE     THIRD     PERIOD     OF     RIVALRY     BETWEEN     THE 
HOUSES  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA  (1547-59). 


Supremacy  of  Charles  V. — Fifth  War  against  France  (1547-56). — 
Last  Struggle  for  Italian  Independence. — Treaty  of  Cateau-Cam- 
bresis  (15  59)- 


CHARLES  V.  profited  by  the  death  of  Francis  I.  and  the 

embarrassments  of  his  successor  to  overwhelm  the  German 

_  ..  Protestants  before  the  hand  of  France  could 

Supremacy   of  . 

Charles  v.  Fifth  be  extended  for  their  protection.  Since  the 
France  ^ow-  treaty  signed  at  Cadan  in  Bohemia  between 
56).  the  Lutherans  and  Catholics  (1534)  the 

insurrection  of  the  Anabaptists  of  Munster  (1534)  and  the 
war  of -Charles  V.  against  Francis  I.  had  hindered  the 
struggle  from  bursting  out  in  Germany.  But  since  the 
treaty  of  Crespy  in  1544  left  Charles  V.  free  from  all  con- 
cern on  the  side  of  France,  and  since  a  truce  of  five  years, 
concluded  with  Souleiman  in  1545,  delivered  him  from  all 
anxiety  on  the  side  of  the  Ottomans,  he  believed  the 
moment  come  to  arrest  the  progress  of  the  Lutherans. 
Brandenburg,  Misnia,  Thuringia,  and  the  Palatinate  had 
gone  over  a  little  before  to  the  side  of  the  Reformation. 
In  1543  the  Archbishop  of  Cologne  in  his  turn  abjured,  and 
despite  his  abjuration  intended  to  retain  his  electorate  and 
his  archbishopric.  But  Rome  under  Paul  III.  had  developed 
an  energy  which  now  stimulated  that  of  the  emperor. 
The  Council  of  Trent  had  opened  (December  13,  1545).  and 
at  its  first  sessions  had  irrevocably  broken  with  the  Protes- 
tants. Condemned  canonically,  they  saw  the  Pope  accord 
the  emperor  13,000  men  to  reduce  them,  a  considerable 
subsidy,  and  half  the  revenues  of  the  Spanish  Church  for  a 
year.  Luther  died  in  1546,  and  did  not  behold  the  com- 
mencement of  the  hostilities  which  he  dreaded.  The 

109 


HO     CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.      [BOOK  II. 

League  of  Smalkalde  had  great  strength,  but  it  lacked  one 
chief  because  it  had  too  many.  The  treason  of  Maurice 
of  Saxony,  who  went  over  to  the  emperor's  side,  broke 
the  league.  The  Elector  of  Saxony  and  the  Landgrave 
of  Hesse  alone  remained  in  arms.  They  counted  upon 
Francis  I.  The  death  of  that  prince  determined  the 
emperor  to  attack  the  elector  at  Mtihlberg  on  the  Elbe  ;  he 
defeated  him  and  made  him  prisoner  (April  23, 1547).  The 
landgrave  alone  could  not  resist;  he  tendered  his  submission. 

Charles  V.  abused  his  victory  by  perfidy  and  harshness. 
The  elector,  stripped  of  his  electorate,  which  the  emperor 
gave  to  Maurice,  was  condemned  to  perpetual  imprison- 
ment. The  landgrave  was  arrested  in  violation  of  promised 
faith,  and  these  two  illustrious  captives  were  insolently 
dragged  in  the  conqueror's  train  through  the  German 
cities  in  order  that  they  might  realize  their  humiliation  and 
that  of  the  German  liberties.  The  latter  in  fact  seemed 
lost.  The  cities  were  filled  with  foreign  soldiery,  and 
heavy  taxes  were  laid  upon  the  people. 

The  emperor  was  not  less  happy  in  Italy  against  the 
Guelphs  than  in  Germany  against  the  Protestants.  At 
Genoa  the  conspiracy  of  Fieschi  against  the  Dorias  failed 
by  the  unexpected  death  of  their  audacious  chief  (Janu- 
ary 2,  1547).  Sienna  received  a  Spanish  garrison  ;  in 
Lombardy,  finally,  Pietro  Luigi  Farnese  was  assassinated  ; 
his  successor,  Octavio,  kept  nothing  but  the  city  of  Parma. 
The  Imperialists  occupied  Piacenza,  and  Philip  of  Spain 
came  to  supervise  the  movements  of  the  pontifical  court. 

Intoxicated  with  his  triumph,  Charles  V.  believed  that  he 
was  able  alone  to  solve  the  religious  question  which 
divided  the  world ;  he  promulgated  at  Augsburg  his 
famous  "interim"  (May  15,  1548).  Everything  bent 
before  the  new  Charlemagne. 

Germany,  endeavoring  to  find  her  constitution,  has  per- 
petually oscillated  between  two  opposite  points.  Otto  I., 
Henry  II.,  Frederick  Barbarossa,  drew  her  in  the  direction 
of  unity  ;  the  great  interregnum  pressed  her  back  toward 
division.  Charles  V.  took  up  then  the  eternal  problem,  but 
he  committed  the  fault  which  had  caused  the  failure  of  his 
great  predecessors  :  he  complicated  this  enterprise  with 
many  others.  The  Italian  republics  in  the  Middle  Ages 
had  saved  German  feudalism  ;  France  in  Modern  Times 
saved  the  German  principalities. 


CHAP.  X.]    RIVALRY  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA.        in 

When  Henry  II.  saw  the  disastrous  consequences  of  the 
defeat  of  the  German  princes  and  the  omnipotence  of  the 
emperor  in  the  empire,  he  said  to  himself  that  such  a 
mighty  person  must  not  be  allowed  the  time  to  become 
settled,  and  he  resolved  upon  war.  The  treaties  with  the 
Swiss  and  the  Ottomans  were  renewed.  He  ransomed 
Boulogne  from  the  English,  whom  he  won  to  his  side, 
though  betrothing  Mary  Stuart,  the  Queen  of  Scotland, 
to  the  dauphin  ;  he  recalled  the  French  prelates  from  the 
Council  of  Trent,  and  sustained  the  house  of  Farnese  in 
Parma  and  Piacenza  against  the  Pope  allied  to  the  emperor. 
But  while  this  policy  made  him  almost  everywhere  the 
enemy  of  the  orthodox,  the  friend  of  heretics  or  miscreants, 
he  offered  in  expiation  the  blood  of  his  Protestant  subjects. 
The  edict  of  Chateaubriand  ordered  the  condemnation  of 
the  Protestants  without  appeal,  closed  the  schools  and  the 
tribunals  against  whoever  had  not  a  certificate  of  orthodoxy, 
and. by  a  custom  borrowed  from  the  worst  times  of  the 
Roman  Empire,  promised  informers  the  third  part  of  their 
victims'  property  (1551). 

In  Germany  especially  was  it  important  to  act.  The 
king  secretly  allied  himself  with  the  Protestant  princes  and 
with  Maurice  of  Saxony,  who  betrayed  the  emperor  now 
that  he  had  nothing  more  to  hope  from  him.  He  took  the 
name  of  Protector  of  German  Liberties,  and  considered  him- 
self as  vicar  of  the  empire  authorized  in  seizing  the  cities 
of  Metz,  Toul,  and  Verdun,  three  sovereign  bishoprics  in 
the  midst  of  the  duchy  of  Lorraine  (1551).  The  occupation 
was  made  without  obstacle.  Toul  opened  its  gates.  Metz, 
a  free  and  prosperous  city,  would  allow  none  to  enter  save 
the  chiefs  of  the  army  ;  the  soldiers  followed,  the  gates 
were  seized,  and  Metz  belonged  to  France.  The  same  sur- 
prise was  attempted  upon  Strasburg,  another  great  free 
city.  The  Strasburgers  replied  with  cannon  balls.  Henry 
could  only  boast  of  having  watered  his  horses  at  the  Rhine. 
Still  when  returning  he  seized  Montmedy,  Ivoy,  Bouillon, 
which  he  did  not  keep,  and  Verdun,  which  has  remained  to 
France  (April,  1552). 

On  his  side  Maurice  of  Saxony  had  barely  missed  cap- 
turing Charles  V.  in  Innsbruck.  The  aged  emperor  had 
just  time  to  flee  across  the  snows  and  the  mountains.  The 
work  of  his  entire  life  was  overturned  in  a  day;  he  under- 
stood it  and  submitted.  The  compromise  of  Passau  abol- 


H2      CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  II 

ished  the  interim  and  granted  liberty  of  conscience  to  the 
Lutherans  (1552).  It  was  the  alliance  of  France  with 
Maurice  of  Saxony  which  had  caused  Charles  V.  this 
bitter  deception  ;  so  he  turned  against  her  with  fury.  At 
the  head  of  60,000  men  he  laid  siege  to  Metz.  The  Duke 
of  Guise  defended  the  place  with  so  much  heroism  that  the 
emperor  was  obliged  to  retire  after  having  lost  half  his 
soldiers.  "  I  well  see,"  he  said,  "  that  fortune  is  a  woman 
who  loves  better  a  youthful  king  than  an  aged  emperor." 
He  should  have  accused  no  one  but  himself  for  having 
undertaken  such  an  operation  in  the  most  unfavorable 
season.  He  was  more  happy  the  following  year  against 
Terouanne,  which  he  took  and  razed. 

The  marriage  of  the  Infante  of  Spain,  Philip,  with  Mary 
Tudor,  Queen  of  England,  imperiled  France.  But  Henry 
displayed  great  activity  (1554);  he  invaded  the  Nether- 
lands and  beat  the  Imperialists  at  Renty,  about  thirteen 
miles  southwest  of  St.  Omer.  On  the  south  he  occupied 
Corsica,  while  Brissac  defended  Piedmont  with  rare  ability. 
But  in  Tuscany  Strozzi,  a  Florentine  exile  in  the  pay  of 
France,  was  beaten  at  Marciano,  and  the  Spaniards  could 
commence  the  siege  of  Siena  (1554).  The  chief  of  the 
Imperialists,  Giovanni  Jacobo  de  Medici,  inaugurated  this 
undertaking  by  horrible  ravages.  He  made  of  this  beauti- 
ful country,  then  covered  with  habitations  and  luxuriant 
gardens,  the  sad  Maremma  of  to-day.  Blaise  de  Montluc 
with  a  few  French  troops  prolonged  the  resistance.  It  was 
only  after  having  lost  20,000  inhabitants  that  Siena  capit- 
ulated and  underwent  Spanish  protection  (1555). 

These  isolated  successes  did  not  console  Charles  V. 
for  his  check  before  Metz  and  the  defeat  of  Renty.  After 
thirty-five  years  of  efforts  he  saw  all  his  projects  overthrown. 
France  was  not  humbled,  Germany  was  not  reduced  to 
servitude,  Protestantism  was  not  crushed.  Discourage- 
ment took  possession  of  him  :  with  the  Protestants  he 
signed  the  peace  of  Augsburg,  with  France  the  truce  of  Vau- 
celles  (February  5,  1556)  ;  then  he  placed  his  crowns  of  Spain, 
Italy,  and  the  Netherlands  upon  the  head  of  his  son,  Philip 
II.  (1556),  and  resigned  the  empire  to  his  brother,  the 
archduke  Ferdinand,  who  was  already  King  of  the 
Romans.  From  that  moment  the  house  of  Austria  was 
separated  into  two  branches,  and  the  vast  dominions  of 
Charles  V.  were  forever  divided.  The  monarch,  volun- 


CHAP.  X.]     RIVALRY  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA.        113 

tarily  fallen,  went  in  quest  of  repose  to  the  monastery  of 
Yuste. 

The  truce  of  Vaucelles  had  been  concluded  for  five 
years  ;  it  lasted  scarcely  five  months. 

At  the  moment  when  Philip  II.  lost  Germany  he  seemed 

to  gain  England  by  a  second  marriage,  espousing  the  queen 

of    that    country,    Mary    Tudor.     He     had 

The  last  strug-  J '  J         .  ,  .         , 

gie  for  Italian  already  one  son,  Don  Carlos ;  for  him  he 
Trdeatyndofceca-  reserved  all  the  Spanish  possessions  and  it 
teau-Cambresis.  was  agreed  that  the  child  who  might  be  born 
from  this  new  union  should  reign  at  once  over  the  Nether- 
lands and  over  England  ;  that  is  to  say,  that  London  and 
Antwerp  should  be  under  the  same  master,  the  Thames 
and  the  Escaut  under  the  same  laws,  and  that  the  North 
Sea  should  become  an  English  lake.  Thus  France  was 
in  her  present  and  future  seriously  menaced  by  this  domina- 
tion which  hemmed  her  in  on  three  sides,  and  which  could 
bring  upon  her  an  English  invasion  against  which  she  had 
no  longer  to  hope  the  assistance  of  Germany.  Henry  II. 
had  signed  with  Charles  V.  the  truce  of  Vaucelles  at  the 
beginning  of  1556;  he  broke  it  the  same  year  (November)  so 
as  not  to  give  Philip  II.  the  time  to  become  established. 
The  Holy  See  was  then  occupied  by  an  old  man  full  of 
fire,  Paul  IV.,  who  was  appalled  at  seeing  the  Spaniards 
beside  him  and  upon  him  at  Naples  and  Milan.  The  king 
and  the  pontiff  united.  One  army  under  the  command  of 
Montmorency  was  sent  toward  the  Netherlands,  another 
under  the  Duke  of  Guise  into  Italy.  They  wished  to 
limit  Philip  II.  to  Spain.  Henry  II.  should  be  strengthened 
on  the  north  by  provinces  adjacent  and  easy  of  defense  ; 
the  duke  Francis  of  Guise,  descending  on  his  mother's 
side  from  the  house  of  Anjou,  hoped  to  become  King  of 
Naples.  The  plan  was  well  combined.  The  energetic 
Paul  IV.  placed  his  spiritual  power  at  the  service  of  France 
and  the  Italian  cause.  He  sustained  Siena  and  openly 
attacked  the  Viceroy  of  Naples,  following  the  example  of 
the  Popes  of  the  Middle  Ages,  arming  and  reviewing  the 
population,  and  even  preaching  a  crusade  against  the  Span- 
iards, "  that  offspring  of  Jews  and  Moors,  the  real  dregs 
of  the  earth." 

At  the  news  that  the  Duke  of  Guise,  invested  with  the 
realm  of  Naples  by  the  Holy  See,  was  approaching  with 
15,000  men,  Philip  II.  made  a  few  concessions  to  the 


H4     CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.     [BOOK  II. 

Italians  in  order  to  divide  them  ;  he  restored  Piacenza  to 
Farnese  and  gave  up  Siena  to  the  Grand  Duke  of  Tuscany. 
This  was  his  salvation  in  Italy.  The  Duke  of  Guise 
traversed  the  Milanais  without  obstacle  and  entered  Rome 
in  triumph,  but  the  Pope  was  unable  to  furnish  him  all  the 
succor  promised  and  he  failed  before  Civitella,  the  first 
Neapolitan  stronghold  which  he  attacked.  He  endeavored 
in  vain  to  bring  the  Duke  of  Alva  to  a  battle.  The 
Spaniard  let  malady  decimate  the  French  army,  and  then 
carried  the  war  into  the  pontifical  territory  and  marched 
upon  Rome.  Immovable  until  the  last  moment  despite 
the  departure  of  the  French,  Paul  IV.  yielded  only  when 
he  saw  the  Romans  themselves  ready  to  open  the  gates  of 
Rome  to  the  Spaniards,  and  to  spare  the  capital  of  the 
Christian  world  the  horrors  of  another  capture  by  storm 
and  of  another  pillage  (1557). 

To  the  disaster  of  St.  Quentin  was  due  the  recall  of  the 
Duke  of  Guise,  so  fatal  to  the  hopes  of  the  Pope  and  of 
Italy.  The  Spaniards,  50,000  strong,  under  the  orders  of 
King  Philip,  and  of  the  duke  Philibert  of  Savoy,  having 
entered  Picardy,  had  invested  St.  Quentin.  The  place  had 
neither  solid  fortifications,  munitions,,  nor  food.  The 
Admiral  Coligny  threw  himself  into  the  city  with  700  men. 
Montmorency  approached  to  provision  it,  but  camped  so 
near  the  enemy  with  an  army  very  inferior  in  number,  and 
took  so  few  precautions,  that  he  was  obliged  to  fight  with- 
out having  assured  his  retreat  ;  the  French  army  was 
destroyed  and  he  himself  remained  a  prisoner  (August  10). 
The  King  of  Spain  was  advised  to  march  upon  Paris  ;  he 
preferred  to  make  himself  master  of  St.  Quentin,  Ham, 
and  Noyon.  While  the  conquerors  wore  themselves  out  in 
this  war  of  sieges,  Henry  II.  had  time  to  put  imposing 
forces  on  foot,  and  the  Duke  of  Guise  returned  from  Italy. 

Named  generalissimo,  this  daring  captain  struck  a  mighty 
blow.  In  the  dead  of  winter  suddenly  he  besieged  Calais 
and  captured  it  after  eight  days  (January,  1558).  The 
shame  of  St.  Quentin  was  lost  in  the  glory  of  this  resound- 
ing success.  The  Duke  of  Guise  was  placed  above  all  con- 
temporary generals  ;  the  popularity  of  the  house  of  Lor- 
raine dates  from  that  day. 

Calais  was  recaptured,  but  the  Spaniards  remained  always 
upon  the  Somme.  The  Marshal  de  Termes,  having  also 
been  defeated  at  Gravelines  (1559),  Henry  II.  opened 


CHAP.  X.]      RIVALRY  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA.       115 

negotiations  for  peace.  After  conferences  lasting  four 
months  the  treaty  of  Cateau-Cambresis  was  concluded 
(April  25,  1559)  on  the  basis  of  mutual  restitutions  in  the 
Netherlands  and  Italy.  The  Duke  of  Savoy  recovered  his 
states  on  the  two  sides  of  the  Alps  (Bresse,  Bugey,  Savoy, 
Piedmont)  except  Pignerol,  Chieri,  and  Savigliano,  which 
France  retained  until  the  rights  of  Louise  of  Savoy, 
grandmother  of  Henry  II.,  had  been  decided.  She  kept 
also  the  marquisate  of  Saluzzo,  but  abandoned  Siena  to 
the  Medici  and  Corsica  to  the  Genoese.  The  three  bishop- 
rics depending  upon  the  empire,  it  did  not  belong  to  Spain 
to  demand  their  restitution  ;  England  left  Calais  to  France 
in  return  for  500,000  crowns.  Philip  again  possessed 
Charolais,  a  little  country  inclosed  in  the  French  provinces, 
and  which  the  French  would  be  able  to  sieze  without 
striking  a  blow  at  the  first  rupture,  but  he  did  not  restore 
to  Jane  d'Albret  the  portion  of  her  kingdom  of  Navarre 
which  Spain  had  retained  during  half  a  century. 

Thus  what  had  been  commenced  in  1530  at  Bologna,  was 
accomplished  in  1559  in  a  little  city  of  Cambresis.  The 
Austro-Spanish  domination  was  firmly  planted  at  the  north 
and  south  of  the  Italian  peninsula  ;  the  Holy  See  as  a 
temporal  power  found  itself  reduced  to  helplessness  ;  the 
dukes  of  Florence,  Parma,  and  Ferrara  were  held  in  lead- 
ing strings,  and  even  the  frontier  of  Italy  remained  in  the 
hands  of  foreigners. 

This  was  for  Italy  a  great  misfortune  and  for  France  a 
check,  because  the  house  of  Austria  despite  its  division 
into  two  branches  remained  as  formidable  at  the  end  as  at 
the  beginning  of  the  struggle.  In  very  truth  Philip  II. 
was  stronger  than  Charles  V.  But  this  check  served  also 
as  a  lesson.  When  losing  on  the  side  of  Italy  provinces 
remote,  and  which  by  no  means  brought  in  what  it  cost  to 
defend  them,  France  gained  on  the  north  Calais — that  is  to 
say,  the  liberation  of  her  territory,  and  the  reconquest  of 
her  integrity — and  the  three  bishoprics  which  constituted  a 
triple  advance  guard  of  strongholds  on  the  frontier  of 
Champagne  ;  conquests  useful,  necessary,  truly  national, 
while  the  more  or  less  durable  acquisition  of  Naples  or  of 
Milan  interested  only  the  dynasty  of  Valois. 

Furthermore,  if  the  French  policy  was  vanquished  be- 
yond the  Alps  it  triumphed  beyond  the  Rhine.  The 
imperial  authority,  null  in  the  empire  before  Charles  V.,  had 


n6      CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  RE I'OLU TION.     [BOOK  II. 

been  for  a  moment  elevated  by  that  prince  to  the  degree  of 
making  men  fear  that  he  would  destroy  at  one  blow  both 
the  political  and  the  religious  liberties  of  Germany.  France 
aided  the  German  princes  to  defend  themselves,  and  the 
peace  of  Augsburg  guaranteed  their  independence.  This 
was  perhaps  an  evil  for  real  German  interests,  and  for 
civilization  in  general,  but  it  was  surely  a  benefit  for 
France,  inasmuch  as  a  monarchy  faithfully  obeyed  from 
the  Meuse  to  the  Oder,  and  from  the  Alps  to  the  North 
Sea,  would  have  exposed  her  to  terrible  dangers.  The 
acquisition  of  Italy  was  by  no  means  a  compensation  to  the 
house  of  Austria  for  what  she  lost  upon  the  Rhine  and  the 
Danube.  Poor  and  robust,  Germany  would  have  given 
her  real  chief  a  strength  which  enervated  Italy  could  not 
furnish. 

Besides,  so  many  wars  did  not  remain  entirely  fruitless. 
They  had  two  important  results,  the  creation  of  the  system 
of  political  equilibrium — balance  of  power — which  long 
protected  the  minor  states  against  the  ambition  of  the 
great,  and  the  development  of  the  Renaissance.  The 
peoples  of  Europe,  mingled  in  the  conflict,  became  better 
acquainted,  and,  brought  into  contact  with  a  brilliant  civili- 
zation, acquired  a  taste  for  the  arts,  letters,  and  sciences, 
which  after  having  remained  till  then  the  almost  exclusive 
possession  of  the  Italians,  now  became  the  common  posses- 
sion of  Christian  nations.  France  was  the  first  to  inherit 
from  Italy.  It  was  in  her,  as  we  shall  shortly  see,  that  the 
Renaissance  shone  with  more  effulgent  splendor  than  it 
had  cast  outside  the  peninsula. 

Finally,  these  wars  had  in  every  state  consequences  at 
once  political  and  military.  The  nobility,  kept  in  a  distant 
and  hostile  country  under  the  harness,  became  supple  in 
obedience  to  the  king,  and  the  discipline  of  camps  conse- 
crated the  revolution  commenced  by  gunpowder  and  by 
standing  armies.  Although  the  attempt  to  create  a  national 
infantry  by  means  of  the  free  archers  had  not  succeeded, 
bands  were  formed  in  France,  Spain,  and  Germany  which 
made  a  profession  of  military  affairs,  which  had  the  draw- 
backs of  mercenary  soldiers,  the  qualities  of  veteran  troops, 
and  which  assured  an  immense  superiority  to  those  who 
could  pay  for  them — that  is  to  say,  the  kings.  Likewise,  if 
the  feudal  weapons,  the  lance  and  the  sword,  remained  the 
principal  weapons  till  Henry  IV.,  others,  as  the  pistol  and 


CHAP.  X.]      RIVALRY  OF  FRANCE  AND  AUSTRIA.       1 1? 

the  arquebuse,  and  especially  the  cannon,  commenced  to 
play  a  part  in  battle ;  Louis  XL  with  his  instinct  of  power 
had  given  attention  to  a  good  organization  of  artillery,  and 
in  1479  concentrated  all  the  administration  in  the  hands  of 
a  grand  master.  In  1494  his  son  took  no  less  than  a 
hundred  and  forty  drawn  cannon  for  the  Italian  expedi- 
tion. 

Every  noble  formerly  could  have  a  lance,  a  strong  suit 
of  armor,  and  a  good  war  horse,  by  means  of  which  he  threw 
himself  with  impunity  into  the  densest  battalions  of  peas- 
ants. Powder  equalized  conditions  upon  the  battlefield  as 
the  kings  were  going  to  equalize  them  in  civil  life.  The 
villain  was  about  to  become  the  equal  of  the  best  armed 
knight  at  the  same  time  that  the  inaccessible  fortresses 
which  had  so  long  sheltered  the  violence  and  activity  of 
the  feudal  lords  ceased  to  be  impregnable.  The  king 
alone  could  possess  artillery,  because  this  weapon  was  too 
costly  for  individuals,  and  because  the  law  was  to  declare 
it  an  exclusively  royal  weapon.  With  cannon  the  royal 
will  could  be  made  to  triumph  everywhere. 


BOOK   III. 

REVOLUTION    IN    INTERESTS,    IDEAS,  AND 
CREEDS. 


CHAPTER   XI. 

THE    ECONOMIC    REVOLUTION,    OR    DISCOVERY    OF 
AMERICA   AND   OF   THE   PASSAGE   TO   INDIA. 


First  Maritime  Discoveries. — Vasco  da  Gama  (1497)  and  the  Colonial 
Empire  of  the  Portuguese. — Christopher  Columbus  (1492). — Cortes 
(1519). — Magellan  (1520). — Pizarro  (1529). — Colonial  Empire  of  the 
Spaniards. — Consequences  of  the  New  Discoveries. — Introduction  of 
Posts  and  of  Canals  with  Locks. 


UP  to  the  present  we  have  considered  the  political  revo- 
lution which  gave  the  kings  of  the  fifthteenth  and  sixteenth 

centuries  the  power  of  directing  at  the  will  of 
discoveries!1"  e  their  personal  ambition  the  national  forces  at 

that  time  brought  together  in  their  hands.  We 
must  now  discuss  the  revolution  which,  in  consequence  of 
maritime  discoveries,  was  taking  place  at  the  same  time  in 
material  interests. 

All  through  the  Middle  Ages  the  commercial  routes  traced 
by  the  Greeks  and  Romans  had  been  followed.  However, 
civilization,  on  reaching  the  farthest  lands  of  the  West,  had 
turned  the  eyes  of  the  people  toward  the  mysterious  extent 
of  that  unknown  sea.  The  Mediterranean  could  not  be  their 
center  of  activity ;  they  had  become  familiar  with  the  billows 
of  the  ocean  and  had  developed  confidence  in  the  compass. 
The  Basques,  pursuing  the  whales  which  sported  in  their 
gulf,  had  pressed  their  chase  and  their  ships  toward  the 
north;  the  Scandinavians,  then  exuberant  with  life  and 
force,  had  from  Norway  gained  Iceland,  then  Greenland, 

118 


THE  ECONOMIC  REVOLUTION,  119 

and  had  descended  by  Labrador  as  far  as  the  lands  where 
rise  to-day  the  magnificent  cities  of  the  American  Union. 
The  Normans,  on  the  contrary,  turning  toward  the  southeast, 
had  coasted  along  the  promontories  of  Spain,  and  arriving  in 
front  of  the  Strait  of  Gibraltar,  instead  of  entering  the  Medi- 
terranean, the  uncontested  domain  of  Italians,  Provengals, 
and  Catalans,  had  not  feared  to  venture  toward  the  African 
shores.  The  people  of  Dieppe  in  1364  reached  Guinea, 
whence  they  brought  back  gold  dust,  ivory,  pepper,  and  gray 
amber;  and  a  gentleman  from  the  environs  of  their  city, 
John  of  Bethencourt,  in  1402  made  the  conquest  of  the 
Canaries.  Associated  with  the  people  of  Rouen,  they  did 
not  cease  until  1410  from  sending  ships  annually  to  the 
African  coast.  The  misfortunes  of  France,  which  then  com- 
menced, and  the  English  invasions  made  this  traffic  cease. 
Through  commercial  jealousy  they  had  so  well  guarded  the 
secret  of  their  discovery  that  they  have  lost  the  honor  of  it. 

There  were,  however,  eyes  which  saw  these  vessels  pass, 
and  men  who  grew  indignant  at  strangers  coming  from  so  dis- 
tant countries  to  reap  the  profits  which  nature  seemed  to  have 
reserved  for  another  people.  After  having  conquered  their 
soil  from  the  Mussulmans  the  Portuguese  found  themselves 
arrested  by  the  parallel  progress  of  Spanish  Christians. 
Africa  was  before  them.  There  they  would  find  conquests 
to  make,  riches  to  gain,  souls  to  convert;  the  most  learned 
and  the  most  intrepid  talked  of  turning  the  continent  as 
formerly  did  the  Phoenicians,  of  opening  a  route  toward  the 
countries  where  were  produced  the  commodities  which  the 
Mussulmans  hardly  allowed  to  pass  by  Alexandria  and  which 
Venice  sold  so  dear;  finally,  of  making  research  after  that 
kingdom  of  Prester  John  in  Eastern  Africa  (Abyssinia)  of 
whom  many  spoke,  whom  none  had  seen,  and  who  appeared 
waiting  for  the  Christian  nations  in  order  to  lead  them  to  the 
conquest  of  the  East. 

From  all  these  causes  the  Portuguese  nation  in  the  fif- 
teenth century  was  seized  with  an  ardor  as  intense  as  at  the 
epoch  of  the  crusade.  The  Infante  Don  Henry,  third  son  of 
King  John  I.,  controlled  this  movement.  He  established 
himself  at  the  extremity  of  the  continent  near  Cape  St.  Vin- 
cent, and  there  in  face  of  those  unknown  seas,  which  his  eye 
pierced  without  cessation,  he  continued  during  more  than 
forty  years  to  send  upon  them  intrepid  sailors  whose  death 
slackened  but  did  not  arrest  those  attempts.  The  clergy 


120  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

united  its  influence  to  that  of  the  prince.  Each  departure 
was  blessed,  each  ship  consecrated,  each  squadron  carried 
its  priests  at  the  side  of  its  mariners,  just  as  in  each  colony 
rose  a  church  between  the  citadel  and  the  factory.  The 
first  to  depart  under  the  direction  of  the  Infante  in  1419  dis- 
covered an  island  which  the  Portuguese  had  probably  known, 
and  which  they  called  Madeira  (wood)  because  it  was  covered 
with  forests.  They  set  fire  to  these  impenetrable  woods; 
tradition  makes  the  conflagration  last  seven  years,  and  attrib- 
utes to  the  ashes  that  fertility  which  has  won  for  Madeira 
the  surname  of  "Queen  of  the  Isles"  ;  the  Infante  had  grape- 
vines carried  there  from  Greece  and  sugar  canes  from  Sicily 
and  Cyprus;  this  last  plant  has  deserted  the  island,  the  first 
still  prospers  there.  Twelve  years  later  the  Azores  were 
discovered.  Encouraged  by  a  bull  of  Pope  Martin  V.,  who 
in  1432  granted  Don  Henry  the  right  of  conquest  over  the 
lands  which  they  should  discover,  together  with  plenary  in- 
dulgence for  those  who  should  perish  in  these  expeditions, 
the  Portuguese  doubled  Cape  Bojador,  which,  beaten  by  a 
stormy  sea,  had  till  then  intimidated  the  most  hardy  navi- 
gators (1433).  After  this  "labor  of  Hercules"  they  trem- 
blingly passed  Cape  Blanc  (1444),  the  tropic  (1446),  beyond 
which  it  was  told  them  the  whites  would  become  black,  then 
Cape  Verd  and  its  islands  (1446).  The  death  of  the  Infante 
in  1464  did  not  retard  the  discoveries.  The  Portuguese  eight 
years  after  arrived  at  St.  Thomas  and  passed  the  line;  in 
1484  they  touched  Guinea,  where  they  found  the  gold  which 
the  English  coined  and  called  guinea  from  the  name  of  the 
country  whence  it  was  derived;  at  last,  in  1486  Bartholomew 
Diaz  recognized  the  cape  which  terminates  Africa  at  the 
south;  he  called  it  the  Cape  of  Storms;  King  John  gave  it 
its  truer  name  which  it  still  bears:  he  called  it  the  Cape  of 
Good  Hope. 

Finally,    there  departed  form   Lisbon   (July  8,   1497,)  a 

squadron  of  four  tiny  ships  of  less  than  a  hundred  tons  burden 

,  „         with  a  crew  of  a  hundred  and  sixty  men  com- 

VascodaGama  ,  ,        „,  „;, 

(1497)  and  the  manded  by  Vasco  da  Gama.  1  he  evening 
ofloThae  p£?iu-  before  the  departure  Gama  partook  of  the  sac- 
guese.  rament  and  a  convent  was  founded  at  the  spot 

where  he  had  quitted  the  shore.  This  first  expedition  was 
only  for  reconnoitering.  The  fleet  touched,  not  without 
peril,  on  the  eastern  shore  of  Africa  at  Mozambique  and 
Monbaca,  where  the  Portuguese  were  astonished  at  again 


CHAP.  XI.]        THE  ECONOMIC  REVOLUTION.  121 

finding  Moors.  The  Mussulman  king  of  Melinda  gave  them 
a  pilot  to  conduct  them  across  the  Indian  Ocean.  In  twenty 
days  they  crossed  the  700  leagues  of  sea  which  separated 
them  from  the  coast  of  Malabar,  and  May  20,  1498  they 
dropped  anchor  before  the  great  city  of  Calicut.  The  Arab 
merchants  since  the  twelfth  century  monopolized  the  trade 
of  India  toward  the  west.  By  their  intrigues  they  hindered 
the  negotiations  of  Gama  with  the  Zamorin  or  King  of  Cali- 
cut, and  his  ships  on  their  return  brought  back  little  wealth, 
but  immense  hope  (1499).  Later  in  the  Lusiad  Camoens 
sang  of  the  heroic  expedition  which  had  opened  India  to 
the  Portuguese. 

Alvarez  Cabral  founded  in  India  the  first  European 
factory,  that  of  Calicut.  On  the  way  he  had  been  assailed 
by  a  tempest,  driven  toward  the  west,  and  thrown  upon  an 
unknown  shore;  it  was  the  coast  of  Brazil,  so  called  from  the 
name  of  a  dyewood  there  found  in  abundance;  Alvarez  had 
first  called  it  the  Holy  Cross.  In  India  he  introduced  the 
policy,  hardly  honorable,  but  profitable,  of  interfering  in  the 
quarrels  of  the  native  kings  in  order  that  each  might  help 
in  the  subjection  of  the  rest. 

D'Almeida  was  the  first  Viceroy  of  India,  and  legitimized 
this  title  by  the  great  victory  of  Diu,  which  took  away  from 
the  Mussulmans  the  domination  of  the  Indian  Ocean  (1508). 
But  the  real  creator  of  the  colonial  empire  of  the  Portuguese 
was  the  great  Albuquerque.  By  the  capture  of  Socotora  at 
the  entrance  of  the  Red  Sea,  and  by  that  of  Ormuz  at  the 
entrance  of  the  Persian  Gulf,  which  he  siezed  in  1507  as 
lieutenant  of  d'Almeida,  he  closed  the  ancient  routes  of 
Indian  commerce  to  the  Mussulmans  and  Venetians.  The 
Shah  of  Persia  demanded  an  annual  indemnity  for  Ormuz; 
Albuquerque  led  the  envoys  before  a  heap  of  grenades  and 
bullets,  then  he  said  to  them:  "That  is  the  sort  of  money 
with  which  the  King  of  Portugal  pays  his  tribute." 

A  Venetian  fleet  whose  ships,  taken  apart  at  Cairo,  had 
been  transported  on  camels'  backs  by  the  Mamelukes  across 
the  desert,  was  destroyed  by  him  (1508).  He  gave  to  Por- 
tuguese India  its  capital  by  taking  possession  of  Goa,  which 
a  river  envelops  with  its  two  arms  so  as  to  form  one  of  the 
most  beautiful  harbors  in  the  world  (1510);  then  he  con- 
quered Malacca  (1511),  secured  the  alliance  of  the  kings  of 
Siam  and  Pegu,  and  reconnoitered  the  Molucca  Islands,  an 
achievement  whereby  the  Portuguese  entered  Oceanica,  a 


122  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

new  world,  one  whose  discovery  has  been  completed  only  in 
our  time.  This  mighty  warrior,  it  is  said,  in  order  to  secure 
to  the  Portuguese  the  uncontested  monopoly  of  the  commerce 
of  India,  dreamed  of  restoring  Egypt  to  the  desert  by  divert- 
ing the  course  of  the  Nile  into  the  Red  Sea;  this  was  the 
counterpart  of  a  project  formed  at  Venice  for  uniting  the 
Red  Sea  and  the  Mediterranean  by  a  canal.  To  revenge 
upon  Islam  the  occupation  of  Jerusalem  and  Constantinople 
he  wished  also  to  destroy  Mecca  and  Medina.  But  nature 
was  stronger  than  his  genius.  He  died  poor  and  almost  in 
disgrace.  When  experiencing  the  injustice  of  the  king  he 
contented  himself  by  saying,  "To  the  tomb,  worn-out  old 
man — to  the  tomb."  He  was  seventy-two  years  old  (1515). 
The  Hindus  cherished  the  recollection  of  his  virtues,  and 
often  came  to  pray  at  his  tomb  for  protection  against  the 
injustices  of  his  successors. 

However,  the  progress  continued.  Scares  (1515-18) 
completed  the  submission  of  Malabar  and  the  conquest  of 
Ceylon;  Nuno  d'Acunhamade  that  of  Diu  (1531),  and  frus- 
trated a  formidable  attack  of  the  Ottomans  of  Souleiman, 
who,  setting  out  from  Egypt  with  an  immense  armament,  en- 
deavored to  drive  from  the  Indian  seas  these  newcomers 
who  were  diverting  to  Lisbon  all  the  commerce  by  which 
formerly  Alexandria  grew  rich  (1538);  finally,  John  de  Castro 
baffled  all  the  coalitions  formed  against  the  Portuguese 
domination,  and  defended  Diu  against  the  Ottomans  of  Sou- 
lei'man,  who  were  led  by  Genoese  engineers.  To  rebuild  the 
ruined  walls  of  the  town  money  was  lacking.  He  demanded 
some  from  the  merchants  of  Goa,  and  sent  them,  it  is  said,  his 
mustaches  as  guarantee  of  the  loan.  When  he  died  in  1548 
he  left  as  heritage  to  his  family  only  three  reals,  but  to  his 
country  an  immense  empire  and  a  consolidated  government. 

From  Lisbon  to  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  from  the  Cape  of 
Good  Hope  to  Hindustan,  from  Hindustan  to  Malacca,  and 
from  Indo-China  to  Japan,  there  was  not  an  important  point 
that  the  Portuguese  had  not  occupied.  From  Mozambique, 
Sofala,  and  Melinda  on  the  coast  of  Africa  they  obtained 
gold  dust  and  ivory;  from  Mascat  and  Ormuz  in  the  Persian 
Gulf,  the  productions  of  central  Asia.  By  Diu  on  the  coast 
of  Guzerat,  by  Goa  on  that  of  Malabar,  by  the  island  of  Cey- 
lon, and  by  Negapatam  on  the  coast  of  Coromandel,  they 
enveloped  all  Hindustan.  Malacca  in  the  peninsula  of  the 
same  name  delivered  to  them  the  commerce  of  the  countries 


CHAP.  XI.]        THE  ECONOMIC  REVOLUTION.  123 

of  Indo-China;  they  occupied  the  Spice  Islands,  Ternate  and 
Timor  in  the  Moluccas;  they  had  an  establishment  at  Macao 
near  Canton,  and  carried  on  traffic  with  Japan, which  yielded 
them  an  enormous  quantity  of  metals.  Their  factories  upon 
the  western  coast  of  Africa  and  on  the  Congo  possessed  im- 
portance only  after  the  introduction  of  the  slave  trade;  for 
a  long  time  Brazil  had  no  other  colonists  than  criminals  and 
deported  Jews.  Goa  was  the  center  of  this  vast  colonial 
empire. 

It  is  difficult  to  conceive  how  in  less  than  half  a  century 
a  people  so  small  could  in  spite  of  so  furious  and  so  numer- 
ous oppositions  cover  with  its  factories  or  dominate  by  its 
fortresses  a  coast  line  of  4000  leagues.  But  we  must  realize 
to  what  degree  the  love  of  lucre  was  excited  by  this  commer- 
cial revolution,  and  what  patriotic  and  religious  heroism  ani- 
mated the  first  colonists  of  India.  Gama,  Cabral,  Albu- 
querque, John  de  Castro,  believed  themselves  the  armed 
apostles  of  civilization  and  faith;  and  in  their  train  in  fact 
came  those  men  who  have  created  a  new  sort  of  heroes, 
the  missionaries.  John  de  Castro  died  in  the  arms  of  St. 
Francis  Xavier. 

This  good  fortune  of  Portugal  was  ruin  for  Venice.  The 
aged  queen  of  the  Adriatic  and  Mediterranean  struggled 
painfully  against  the  necessity  which  was  slaying  her.  She 
attempted  force  and  united  with  Souleiman  in  dispatching  a 
powerful  armament  from  Egypt;  the  enterprise  having  failed, 
she  made  use  of  entreaties  and  begged  of  the  Portuguese  to 
associate  her  with  their  commerce:  they  refused;  to  buy  of 
them  at  a  fixed  price  the  productions  brought  to  Lisbon,  a 
new  refusal.  Then  she  freed  from  all  tax  the  merchandise 
arriving  through  Egypt,  and  taxed  heavily  that  which  came 
by  way  of  the  Cape.  But  the  former  daily  grew  more  rare, 
the  latter  more  abundant;  Lisbon  became  the  great  entrepot 
of  Eastern  commodities.  The  Dutch  came  to  buy  them 
there  and  thence,  in  place  of  the  Italian  merchants,  dis- 
tributed them  through  all  Europe. 

To  find  the  route  to  India  by  the  east  was  the  idea  of  all 
the  Portuguese  navigators;  to  find  it  by  the  west  was  the 
idea  of  Columbus.  A  mariner  at  fourteen,  the  Genoese 
Christopher  Columbus  early  gave  special  attention  to  the 
sphericity  of  the  earth  and  the  possibility  of  passing 
around  it.  India  was  supposed  to  be  very  extended  east- 
ward, through  the  necessity  of  counterbalancing  the  Euro- 


124  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

pean  continent.  Waves  had  been  known  to  bring  from 
the  west  sculptured  wood,  uprooted  trees,  and  even  two 
dead  bodies  of  men  different  from  Euro- 
ColumbtusP(i493);  peans.  The  point  at  issue  was  therefore  to 
Cortes  (1519) ;  reach  the  Indian  continent  without  circum- 

Magellan  (1520;  ;  .  ,   .          ,  .  ,  .. 

Pizarro  (1539).  navigating  Africa  by  crossing  the  thus  far 
dl.  ""explored  Atlantic.  Columbus  presented 
his  project  to  the  senate  of  Genoa,  who 
rejected  it  as  the  dream  of  a  madman;  to  the  King  of 
Portugal,  John  II.,  who  endeavored  to  rob  him  of  it; 
to  the  King  of  England,  Henry  VII.,  whom  his  brother 
went  to  seek;  finally,  to  the  sovereigns  of  Spain,  Ferdi- 
nand and  Isabella,  who,  entirely  occupied  with  the  siege 
of  Granada,  refused  to  listen  to  him.  The  learned  men 
of  the  epoch  proposed  terrible  objections:  "How  will  you 
hold  yourself  up  with  your  head  downward?  How  will  you 
climb  again  the  convex  surface  of  the  globe?"  One  man, 
the  prior  Juan  Peres,  alone  understood  Columbus,  and  made 
Isabella  understand  him.  After  the  conquest  of  Granada 
this  great  queen  called  for  the  Genoese,  who,  immovable  in 
his  idea,  had  already  started  to  carry  his  project  elsewhere. 
Ferdinand  and  Isabella,  "sovereigns  of  the  ocean,"  named 
Columbus  "grand  admiral  of  all  the  seas  and  viceroy  of 
the  lands  which  he  should  discover."  Castile  made  the 
sacrifice  of  100,000  livres.  Three  poor  vessels,  the  Santa 
Maria  commanded  by  Columbus,  the  Pinta  and  the  Nina 
by  the  Pinpon  brothers,  started  August  3,  1492,  from  the  port 
of  Palos;  they  touched  at  the  Canaries,  and  on  quitting  these 
islands  they  launched  out  into  the  unknown.  Three  weeks 
they  sailed  westward.  Many  times  birds  and  large  weeds 
made  them  believe  they  were  approaching  land ;  but  these 
hopes  vanished  like  those  of  the  traveler  deceived  by  the 
mirage  of  the  desert.  Always  they  went  on  ;  but  according 
as  they  withdrew  from  the  known  world  to  plunge  into  im- 
mensity, anxiety  and  terror  took  possession  of  their  minds. 
Soon  the  crew  mutinied,  wished  to  return,  and  Columbus 
dissuaded  them  only  by  means  of  firmness.  Finally,  during 
the  night  of  October  n  a  sailor  of  the  Pinta,  which 
was  in  the  lead,  cried  out,  "Land!"  and  at  daybreak  the 
Spaniards  discovered  a  delicious  island.  Upon  the  shore 
Columbus  fell  upon  his  knees  and  gave  thanks  to 
Heaven.  He  was  on  the  tiny  island  Guanahani,  one  of 
the  Lucaye  or  Bahama  Islands.  By  descending  less  toward 


CHAP.  XI.]        THE  ECONOMIC  REVOLUTION.  12$ 

the  south  he  would  have  sooner  discovered  the  American 
continent. 

It  is  the  lot  of  inventors  to  discover  sometimes  more  than 
they  seek,  but  such  good  fortune  happens  only  to  creative 
geniuses.  Columbus  always  believed  that  he  had  touched 
the  Indian  continent,  and  like  him  we  still  call  this  new 
land  the  West  Indies.  At  his  first  voyage  (1492)  Columbus 
discovered  only  islands:  the  Bahamas,  Cuba  with  its  fine 
roadstead  of  Havana,  the  most  beautiful  there  is  in  the  world, 
and  Hispaniola  (Hayti  or  San  Domingo).  In  the  second 
(1493)  he  touched  at  many  of  the  small  Antilles.  Only  at 
the  third  (1498)  did  he  see  the  mouth  of  the  Orinoco  and 
touch  the  continent  without  knowing  it.  Finally,  in  the 
fourth  in  1502  he  reconnoitered  the  coasts  of  Colombia  from 
Cape  Gracias-a-Dios  as  far  as  the  harbor  of  Puerto  Bello, 
and  even  the  entrance  of  the  Gulf  of  Darien. 

But  already  envy  attacked  the  great  man.  On  return  from 
his  first  voyage  enough  honors  could  not  be  heaped  upon 
him.  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  had  him  sit  covered  in  their 
presence  as  a  grandee  of  Spain ;  on  the  second  the  enthu- 
siasm fell.  They  had  counted  on  an  ample  cargo  of  gold; 
Columbus  brought  back  only  little.  On  the  third  persecu- 
tion commenced.  Loaded  with  chains  and  under  the  impu- 
tation of  treason,  he  returned  to  Europe.  Isabella  hastened 
to  make  reparation  for  this  outrage.  Nevertheless  he  was 
only  able  to  again  set  out  four  years  later;  and  when  he 
arrived  before  Hispaniola  he  was  forbidden  to  land.  He 
remained  a  long  time  deprived  of  all  succor  on  the  coast  of 
Jamaica,  where  he  had  run  aground,  and  he  wandered  two 
years  in  the  sea  of  the  Antilles.  On  his  return  Ferdinand 
the  Catholic  received  him  coldly;  Isabella,  his  protectress, 
was  dying.  Overwhelmed  with  disappointments,  worn  out 
with  fatigue,  he  survived  her  only  two  years  (1506).  He 
wished  to  be  buried  with  the  chains  he  had  worn.  His 
body  rests  in  the  cathedral  of  Havana;  only  upon  the  mau- 
soleum of  his  son  at  Seville  does  one  read  these  two  verses: 

A  Castilla  y  a  Leon 
Nuevo  mundo  dio  Colon. 

Posterity  has  consecrated  another  injustice,  whereby  has 
been  given  to  America  the  name  of  the  Florentine  Amerigo 
Vespucci,  who  in  1497  or  1499  touched  the  continent  and 


126  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.        [BOOK  III. 

published  the  first  description  spread  through  Europe  of 
the  new  lands. 

The  route  once  found,  discoveries  succeeded  rapidly.  In 
1513  Balboa  traversed  the  isthmus  of  Panama,  and  was  the 
first  to  look  upon  the  vast  ocean  of  which  he  took  possession 
in  the  name  of  the  crown  of  Spain,  entering  its  waters  sword 
in  hand.  In  1518  Grijalva  discovered  Mexico,  and  Ferdi- 
nand Cortes  almost  immediately  began  its  conquest. 

Mexico  had  been  for  a  hundred  and  thirty  years  the  most 
powerful  state  in  America  through  the  number  of  its  inhab- 
itants, their  courage,  and  even  their  civilization.  Cortes 
had  only  700  soldiers,  18  horses,  and  10  campaign  pieces. 
But  the  victory  of  the  Spaniards  was  rendered  almost  inevi- 
table by  their  superiority  in  arms  and  discipline,  by  the 
audacity  and  sang-froid  of  their  chief,  by  his  pitiless  policy, 
and  more  than  all  by  the  almost  superstitious  astonishment 
of  the  natives  at  sight  of  white  men  who  carried  the  thunder 
in  their  hands.  Setting  out  from  Cuba,  Cortes  landed  (April, 
1519)  not  far  from  Tabasco  and  coasted  along  the  gulf  as  far 
as  the  place  which  was  called  St.  Jean  d'Ulloa,  and  which 
became  the  port  of  Vera  Cruz,  founded  by  Cortes.  Then  he 
burned  his  ships  so  as  to  leave  his  followers  no  hope  save 
victory, and  attacked  first  the  aristocratic  republic  of  Tlascala. 
He  appalled  the  warriors  with  his  cannon,  and  after  having 
forced  6000  of  them  to  follow  him  as  auxiliaries,  he  ad- 
vanced upon  Mexico,  the  capital  of  the  empire.  This  city, 
situated  upon  a  lake  and  defended  by  more  than  300,000 
inhabitants,  was  accessible  only  by  a  narrow  causeway. 
He  declared  himself  the  friend  of  Montezuma,  under  this 
title  entered  the  city,  and  one  day,  followed  by  only  fifty 
Spaniards,  penetrated  the  palace  of  the  emperor,  seized  his 
person,  and  obliged  him  to  acknowledge  himself  vassal  and 
tributary  of  Charles  V.  (1519). 

The  Governor  of  Cuba,  Velasquez,  jealous  of  his  successes, 
sent  against  him  an  army  of  more  than  1000  Spaniards. 
Cortes  won  them  over  and  tripled  his  forces.  At  this 
moment  broke  out  a  patriotic  revolt  of  the  Mexicans: 
Montezuma  was  slain  while  wishing  to  appease  his  people, 
and  the  Spaniards  were  driven  from  Mexico;  but  the  bloody 
victory  of  Otumba  brought  them  back  under  the  walls  of  this 
city,  which  they  captured  (August  13,  1521),  and  the  new 
emperor,  Guatemozin,  was  placed  with  his  first  minister  upon 
burning  coals  that  he  might  be  compelled  to  declare  where 


CHAP.  XI.]        THE   ECONOMIC  REVOLUTION.  127 

he  had  hidden  his  treasures.  Suffering  extorted  complaints 
from  the  minister.  "And  I,"  said  Gautemozin,  "am  I  on  a 
bed  of  roses?"  Cortes  tarnished  his  glory  by  cruelties.  In 
the  province  of  Panuco  alone  60  caciques,  or  chiefs,  and 
400  nobles  were  burned.  Other  incursions  brought  Cortes 
as  far  as  California.  He  had  the  fate  of  Christopher 
Columbus;  jealous  calumnies  called  him  back  to  Spain; 
he  was  stripped  of  his  command ;  to  obtain  an  audience 
he  was  obliged  to  break  through  the  press  which  surrounded 
the  carriage  of  the  emperor.  Seeing  him  erect  upon  the 
step  of  the  carriage  door,  Charles  V.  asked  who  that  man 
was.  "It  is, "  replied  Cortes,  "he  who  has  given  you  more 
states  than  your  father  left  you  cities."  This  reply  gave 
the  finishing  stroke  to  his  disgrace;  he  died  in  destitution. 

While  Ferdinand  Cortes  was  subduing  Mexico  the  Portu- 
guese Magellan,  entering  into  the  service  of  Charles  V., 
undertook  to  make  by  sea  the  circuit  of  the  globe,  and 
attaining  by  the  west  the  innumerable  islands  of  the  Pacific 
Ocean,  which  the  Portuguese  reached  by  the  east,  to  dispute 
their  conquest  with  the  latter.  He  set  out  from  Spain 
(September  20,  1519),  discovered  (October  21,  1520),  the 
strait  which  bears  his  name  between  South  America  and 
Terra  del  Fuego,  crossed  the  Pacific  Ocean,  and  in  March, 
1521,  approached  the  Philippines.  He  perished  in  a  com- 
bat with  the  natives  of  these  islands;  but  his  lieutenant,  del 
Cano,  accomplished  the  enterprise.  The  squadron,  con- 
tinuing to  sail  westward,  reached  the  Molucca  Islands  to  the 
great  astonishment  of  the  Portuguese,  who  could  not  under- 
stand that  it  had  arrived  at  Tidor  by  the  eastern  sea,  and, 
doubling  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  arrived  in  Spain  1124 
days  after  it  had  set  out.* 

In  the  time  of  Prince  Henry  the  Portuguese  had  obtained 
from  the  Holy  See  the  possession  of  everything  which  they 
should  discover;  Columbus  having  found  America,  the 
Spaniards  applied  to  the  Pope,  who  divided  the  globe  between 
the  two  peoples  by  aline  of  demarcation  drawn  270  leagues 
west  of  the  Azores.  But  seeing  that  the  world  was  round, 

*  Of  this  expedition  Dr.  Draper  well  says  in  his  work  upon  the  intel- 
lectual development  of  Europe  :  "In  the  whole  history  of  human  under- 
takings there  is  nothing  that  exceeds,  if  indeed  there  is  anything  which 
equals,  this  voyage  of  Magellan.  That  of  Columbus  dwindles  away  in 
comparison."  Later  on  he  speaks  of  it  as  "  the  greatest  achievement  in 
the  history  of  the  human  race." — ED. 


128  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

the  two  nations  found  themselves  confronting  each  other  in 
the  other  hemisphere.  East  of  the  Moluccas  they  traced  a 
new  line,  which  they  also  called  the  demarcation  (1522). 

The  conquest  of  Peru  was  much  more  easy  than  that  of 
Mexico,  the  natives  being  less  warlike.  One  day  when  the 
Spaniards  of  the  isthmus  of  Panama  were  weighing  parcels 
of  gold  an  Indian  overturned  their  balances,  saying  that 
after  four  suns'  march  southward  they  would  find  a  country 
where  gold  was  so  common  as  to  be  employed  in  the  meanest 
uses.  Three  adventurers  hearing  these  words,  Almagro, 
de  Luque,  and  Pizarro,  made  themselves  the  chiefs  of  a  new 
expedition.  A  foundling,  a  schoolmaster,  and  a  soldier  of 
fortune  took  upon  themselves  to  subdue  an  empire  500 
leagues  in  length,  and  did  subdue  it  in  six  years  (1529-35). 
At  Peru  reigned  the  dynasty  of  the  Incas,  who  called  them- 
selves children  of  the  sun.  Pizarro  made  himself  master  of 
Cuzco,  and  following  the  example  of  Cortes,  seized  the 
Indian  prince  in  the  midst  of  his  court  in  order  to  oblige  him 
for  his  ransom  to  fill  with  gold  a  chamber  twenty-two  feet 
high,  then  had  him  strangled.  Meanwhile  one  of  his  officers 
captured  Quito.  Almagro  penetrated  into  Chili,  but  divi- 
sion of  the  Incas'  riches  embroiled  the  associates.  Other 
adventurers,  among  them  three  brothers  of  Pizarro,  hastened 
over  from  Spain,  and  by  multiplying  the  shares  complicated 
the  quarrels.  Cuzco,  the  capital  of  the  Incas,  became  the 
theater  of  a  bloody  strife,  of  which  the  Peruvians  remained 
inactive  spectators.  Almagro,  made  prisoner,  had  his  head 
cut  off,  but  his  partisans  assassinated  Pizarro  in  his  palace  at 
Lima,  which  he  had  founded  (1541).  Only  after  long  and 
atrocious  wars,  during  which  most  of  the  conquerors  perished, 
did  the  country  draw  breath,  pacified  by  Pedro  de  la  Gasca 
(1546),  and  the  authority  of  the  crown  was  established  firmly 
in  Peru  and  Chili.  In  1535  other  Spaniards  had  founded 
Buenos  Ayres  at  the  mouth  of  the  La  Plata  on  the  opposite 
coast  of  South  America. 

The  Venetian  John  Cabot,  in  the  service  of  the  English 
king,  Henry  VII.,  discovered  Newfoundland  (1497);  his  son 
Sebastian,  who  proposed  the  problem,  solved  only  a  few 
years  ago,  of  the  northwest  passage,  reconnoitered  Hudson's 
Bay.  In  1524  the  Florentine  Verozzani  took  possession  of 
Newfoundland  in  the  name  of  France,  and  in  1534  Jacques 
Cartier  of  St.  Malo  discovered  Canada.  Thus  the  two 
peoples  who  were  to  dispute  North  America  with  so  much 


CHAP.  XI.]        THE  ECONOMIC  REVOLUTION.  129 

desperation  had  arrived  at  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth 
century,  but  had  established  themselves  firmly  only  toward 
its  end. 

The  Portuguese  and  the  Spaniards  did  not  follow  the  same 
system  in  the  organization  of  their  colonies.  The  Portuguese 
Empire  had  been  founded  progressively  by  a  succession  of 
regular  efforts  ;  besides,  it  was  composed  of  strongholds  and 
of  factories  from  Annobon  in  Africa  as  far  as  Tidor  in 
Oceanica.  It  had  therefore  been  necessary  to  arm  the 
governor  or  general  with  absolute  authority.  Thus  the  first 
viceroys,  as  Albuquerque  and  John  de  Castro,  united  in  their 
hands  civil  power  and  command  of  the  troops.  This  omnip- 
otence, arising  from  the  very  nature  of  things,  early  dis- 
quieted the  kings  of  Portugal,  who  believed  they  found  a 
remedy  by  every  three  years  renewing  their  colonial  adminis- 
tration from  top  to  bottom.  The  governors  henceforth  had 
only  one  care,  to  make  their  fortunes  rapidly  to  the  great  det- 
riment of  the  colonies.  Thence  arose  an  appalling  demorali- 
zation which  even  invaded  the  capital.  Everybody  disputed 
the  profits  of  Indian  commerce:  the  king,  through  the 
monopolies  which  reserved  to  the  government  the  exclusive 
control  of  certain  products,  and  obliged  the  merchants  to 
hire  state  vessels  for  the  transport  of  merchandise;  state 
functionaries,  by  bribery;  private  individuals,  by  smuggling. 
This  explains  the  rapid  decline,  then  the  ruin,  of  these  estab- 
lishments, where,  besides,  never  more  than  a  small  number 
of  Portuguese  established  themelves,  and  which  were  always 
factories  rather  than  colonies.  Moreover,  the  commodities 
of  India  being  generally  not  bulky,  such  as  spices,  cotton 
and  silk  stuffs,  pearls,  gold  dust,  ivory  and  precious  stones, 
did  not  necessitate  the  creation  of  a  considerable  marine; 
since  Portugal  received  those  commodities,  but  did  not 
distribute  them  to  Europe,  others,  and  especially  the  Dutch, 
enjoyed  the  surest  profits  of  this  commerce.  Now  the  world 
came  to  Lisbon  after  Indian  commodities;  in  less  than  a 
century  they  will  be  sought  in  India  itself,  and  then  the 
fortunes  of  Portugal  will  fall. 

The  chief  object  of  the  Spanish  colonies  was  at  first  the 
working  of  mines;  as  this  needed  many  arms,  and  as  men  be- 
lieved it  was  necessary  to  only  shake  the  ground  a  little  in 
the  West  Indies  in  order  to  pick  up  gold,  Spain  depopulated 
herself  to  populate  the  New  World.  She  had  therefore  in 
America,  instead  of  the  long  and  brittle  chain  of  Portuguese 


130  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.        [BOOK  III. 

factories,  a  dominion  compact  if  not  homogeneous,  not 
difficult  to  preserve,  because  the  populations  there  were  in- 
offensive, because  large  cities  permitted  her  to  hold  all  the 
country  with  a  few  troops,  and  because  Spain  was  strong 
enough  in  herself  to  cause  her  power  to  be  long  respected 
by  states  which  could  grow  only  slowly  like  all  those  which 
give  themselves  up  to  mining.  Spain  first  took  skillful  meas- 
ures to  prevent  a  separation.  In  virtue  of  the  bull  of  Pope 
Alexander  VI.  the  king  was  declared  absolute  master  of  the 
soil  of  the  regions  discovered.  Every  possession  there  was 
then  only  a  concession  on  his  part,  and  all  authority  there  was 
a  temporary  and  limited  delegation  of  his  own.  The  whole 
of  the  countries  conquered  were  divided  into  two  govern- 
ments, that  of  Mexico,  or  New  Spain,  and  that  of  Lima,  or 
Peru.  Each  government  had  a  viceroy,  commander  of  the 
military  forces  and  chief  of  the  civil  administration,  with  a 
so-called  audience,  a  tribunal  independent  of  the  viceroy  in 
judicial  affairs,  although  presided  over  by  him,  serving  him 
as  council  in  non-judicial  affairs,  and  able  to  make  remon- 
strances, which  he,  however,  was  not  obliged  to  take  into 
consideration.  Later  a  third  viceroy  was  established  at 
Santa  Fe  de  Bogota,  a  fourth  in  1778  at  Buenos  Ayres,  and 
the  number  of  audiences  was  raised  to  eleven.  These  vari- 
ous colonial  authorities  depended  upon  the  Council  of  the 
Indies,  created  in  1511  by  Ferdinand,  and  organized  in  1524 
by  Charles  V.  From  this  council  emanated  all  laws  relative 
to  the  government  and  to  the  police  of  the  colonies;  every 
person  employed  in  America,  from  the  viceroy  to  the  low- 
est official,  was  subordinated  to  it.  As  the  king  was  sup- 
posed always  present  at  the  council,  the  sessions  took  place 
only  in  the  spot  where  the  court  remained.  For  commer- 
cial affairs  and  judicial  cases,  civil  as  well  as  criminal,  which 
resulted  from  the  traffic  between  Spain  and  the  colonies,  a 
special  court  had  been  established  at  Seville  in  1501. 

The  cities  had  their  town  councils,  but  every  position  in  the 
government  was  forbidden  to  the  Spaniards  born  in  the 
country;  thus  the  metropolis  held  the  Creoles  apart,  just  as 
they  kept  themselves  aloof  from  the  Indians.  So  the  popu- 
lation presented,  as  it  were,  a  superposition  of  castes:  Span- 
iards from  Europe,  public  functionaries  or  merchants, 
soldiers  or  adventurers,  Creoles,  half  breeds  of  various 
degrees,  Indians,  and,  still  lower,  mulattoes  and  negroes, 
all  separated  by  antipathies,  which  reassured  the  home 


CHAP.  XL]        THE  ECONOMIC  REVOLUTION.  131 

government  against  a  coalition,  but  which,  however,  one 
day  were  effaced  before  the  common  desire  for  indepen- 
dence. 

Spain,  considering  that  her  colonies  were  to  be  only  an 
immense  workshop  for  the  production  of  precious  metals, 
forbade  the  colonists  to  cultivate  European  products,  flax, 
hemp,  the  vine,  to  produce  manufactures  or  to  construct 
ships.  She  wished  that  they  should  be  able  to  buy  nothing 
except  of  her,  so  that  the  monopoly  should  give  life  to  her 
industry  and  commerce.  Foreigners  received  no  license  to 
establish  themselves  in  the  colonies.  It  was  only  later  that 
America  exported  in  large  quantity  its  natural  products: 
cochineal,  indigo,  logwood  for  dyeing,  mahogany  for  cabi- 
net work,  cocao,  tobacco,  quinine.  All  this  commerce,  cen- 
tered in  the  hands,  not  of  companies,  but  of  a  few  opulent 
houses,  was  carried  on  exclusively  by  Seville.  Every  year 
there  set  out  from  that  city  twelve  great  ships,  or  galleons, 
for  Puerto  Bello  in  New  Granada,  and  fifteen  for  Vera  Cruz 
in  Mexico,  which  carried  to  the  colonies  the  products  of 
Spanish  industry  and  brought  back  colonial  commodities, 
and  especially  piastres  coined  from  the  silver  of  the  mines. 

Portugal  also  reserved  for  herself  the  monopoly  of  Brazil- 
ian commerce.  Every  year  the  fleet  departed  in  the  month 
of  March  from  Lisbon  for  Pernambuco,  San  Salvador,  and 
Rio  Janeiro.  The  result  was  the  same.  Industry  and  com- 
merce, fettered  in  the  colonies  by  senseless  prohibitions, 
could  not  develop,  and  smitten  with  torpor  in  the  capital  by 
the  restriction  which  removed  from  them  competition,  soon 
began  to  decrease.  Evil  economic  measures,  combined 
with  the  disastrous  policy  of  Charles  V.,  pressed  Spain  to 
her  ruin  and  the  colonies  to  revolt.  The  war  of  Mexican 
independence  in  1810  commenced  at  the  village  of  Dolores, 
whose  vines  the  government  ordered  should  be  pulled  up. 

During  the  first  days  of  conquest  they  had  troubled  them- 
selves little  about  the  Indians;  they  had  either  employed 
them  in  the  labor  of  the  mines  without  consideration  for  their 
feebleness  or  divided  them  among  the  proprietors  for  culti- 
vation of  the  soil.  Hence  slavery  in  America  commenced. 
Its  effects  were  quickly  seen.  The  island  of  Hispaniola  had 
1,000,000  inhabitants  in  1492;  nineteen  years  after  there 
remained  14,000! 

A  good  man,  Las  Casas,  Bishop  of  Chiapa  in  Mexico,  pro- 
tested against  this  atrocious  abuse  of  force.  During  fifty 


132  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

years  he  did  not  cease  to  plead  the  cause  of  the  Indians. 
In  his  book,  entitled  "Miscellany  Concerning  the  Destruction 
of  the  Indians,"  one  may  read  of  the  atrocities  committed 
by  the  Spaniards,  of  the  murderous  labors  and  tortures,  and 
the  chase  after  Indians  with  dogs  nourished  with  human  flesh 
that  they  might  better  discover  the  scent.  His  Christian 
complaints  did  not  resound  in  vain.  Charles  V.  promulgated 
numerous  laws  in  the  interest  of  the  natives,  whose  personal 
liberty  was  guaranteed,  and  who  had  only  to  render  the  con- 
queror certain  duties  of  feudal  service  and  to  pay  certain 
tributes.  But  these  advantages  cost  dear  to  another  race. 
Las  Casas  himself  advised  the  transportation  into  America 
of  negroes  bought  on  the  African  coast,  as  they  were  more 
robust  and  more  capable  of  supporting  the  fatigues  of  colo- 
nial labor.  In  1517  Charles  V.  gave  the  monopoly  of 
annually  transporting  4000  slaves  to  one  of  his  favorites, 
who  sold  this  right  to  the  Genoese.  The  latter  bought  slaves 
from  the  Portuguese,  masters  of  the  factories  of  Africa; 
and  the  horrible  traffic  of  which  our  century  will  see  the  end 
began. 

The  natives  of  Brazil  were  treated  by  the  Portuguese  with 
no  less  cruelty.  Even  here  all  those  who  did  not  protect 
their  liberty  in  the  recesses  of  the  woods  were  reduced  to 
slavery,  and  cultivation,  having  been  greatly  developed, 
especially  that  of  the  sugar  cane,  which  was  brought  from 
Madeira,  the  number  of  hands  was  increased  by  the  pur- 
chase of  negroes. 

The  imposition  of  laws  and  the  condemnation  of  one  race 
to  labor  in  place  of  another  did  not  suffice  to  rescue  from 
barbarism  these  innumerable  hordes  of  wandering  hunters. 
How  attach  them  to  the  soil  without  civilizing  them,  and 
how  civilize  them  without  converting  them?  The  power  of 
Spain  was  therefore  essentially  linked  with  the  success  of 
its  missions.  The  progress  of  the  Cross  was  slower  than  that 
of  the  sword.  The  first  missionaries  belonging  to  the  men- 
dicant orders  shared,  or  did  not  dare  openly  to  brave,  the 
prejudices  of  the  coarse  and  barbarous  adventurers  who  had 
begun  the  discovery  and  colonization  of  the  country.  The 
Gospel  must  be  for  these  poor  natives  a  protection  before  it 
was  a  light.  Could  they  see  brothers  in  their  executioners? 
"Let  thyself  be  baptized,"  said  a  Franciscan  to  one  of  them, 
"and  thou  shalt  go  to  heaven."  "Do  the  Spaniards  go 
there?"  "Yes,  but  only  those  who  are  wise  and  good." 


CHAP.  XL]        THE  ECONOMIC  REVOLUTION.  .  133 

"Then  I  do  not  wish  to  go  to  heaven."  But  the  zeal  of  the 
missionaries  increased  with  the  difficulties  of  their  task;  by 
their  courage,  and  especially  by  the  superiority  of  their  views, 
the  Jesuits  placed  themselves  in  the  first  rank  in  these  glorious 
enterprises.  In  the  Portuguese  colonies  one  of  the  three 
founders  of  the  fraternity,  St.  Francis  Xavier,  the  friend  and 
compatriot  of  Ignatius  Loyola,  gave  an  example  of  devotion 
and  success.  In  less  than  ten  years  he  covered  with 
churches,  colleges,  and  seminaries  all  Portuguese  India,  and 
attacked  Japan,  where  he  made  3000  conversions.  In  his 
tireless  ardor  this  pacific  conqueror,  who  had  gone  farther 
than  Alexander,  wished  to  carry  the  Gospel  into  China,  when 
he  died  in  the  island  of  Sancian  (1552). 

Xavier  was  renowned  without  desiring  it;  the  glory  of  his 
disciples  and  imitators  was  not  less  great,  though  it  has  been 
nameless.  In  1556  the  Society  of  Jesus  counted  all  the 
Spanish  and  Portuguese  colonies  as  in  the  number  of  its 
provinces.  The  Indians  were  converted  in  crowds,  some 
touched  by  the  beautiful  stories  or  struck  by  the  great  truths 
of  the  Gospel;  others  yielding  to  the  influence  of  pompous 
splendors  in  the  Catholic  Church.  For  many  the  spectacle  of 
a  superior  civilization  and  of  the  material  advantages  which 
it  brought  was  a  motive  of  conversion ;  for  all  the  instinctive 
ascendancy  of  virtue,  and  principally  the  heroic  sweetness  of 
the  missionaries.  Thus  there  arose,  creation  of  the  Christian 
word,  thousands  of  villages  which,  ordinarily  built  upon  the 
banks  of  the  principal  streams,  served  as  a  bond  between 
the  cities  and  assured  their  necessary  provisioning. 

The  missionaries  were  the  active  militia  of  the  Church  ; 
they  toiled  in  the  desert.  In  ancient  villages,  in  the  boroughs 
and  cities,  they  were  the  instructors,  the  cures;  above  there 
were  the  bishops  with  their  chapters;  at  the  summit  of  the 
hierarchy,  the  archbishops  of  Mexico  and  Lima;  later,  those 
of  Caraccas,  of  Santa  Fe  de  Bogota,  and  of  Guatemala.  All 
this  clergy,  in  virtue  of  the  privileges  conceded  by  Alexander 
VI.  and^Julius  II.  was  entirely  dependent,  not  upon  the 
Pope,  wKb  had  only  the  confirmation  of  the  pastors  chosen, 
but  upon  the  king,  who  appointed  to  all  the  benefices.  So  the 
religious  bond  fortified  the  political  bond  which  attached  the 
colonies  to  the  parent  state.  To  recruit  this  rich  and  powerful 
Church  of  Spanish  America  a  multitude  of  cloisters,  of  semi- 
naries and  colleges,  was  founded,  and  public  instruction  had 
its  center  in  the  two  great  universities  of  Lima  and  Mexico. 


134  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

It  is  thus  that  the  Catholic  Church  consolidated  in  America 
the  dominion  of  Spain  at  the  same  time  that  it  mitigated  the 
evils  of  conquest  ;  thus  it  consoled  the  conquered  by  per- 
paring  them  through  a  better  civilization  for  their  future 
enfranchisement.  Unhappily  it  did  not  arm  itself  for  this 
great  labor  with  the  spirit  of  charity  alone.  It  accepted  the 
succor  of  the  Inquisition,  which  Philip  II.  established  in  the 
New  World  with  its  retinue  of  terrors  and  tortures  as  a  curb 
against  the  passions  of  every  sort  that  were  seething  there. 
It  is  especially  in  America  that  this  horrible  institution  had 
an  essentially  political  end,  and  served  as  auxiliary  to  the 
royal  authority.  There  it  could  with  a  much  greater  energy 
than  on  the  other  side  of  the  ocean  exercise  over  men's  minds 
its  deadly  power.  During  three  centuries  and  a  half  what 
has  come  forth  from  Mexico  and  Peru  in  which  the  civiliza- 
tion of  the  world  can  glory? 

These  discoveries  had,  however,  important  results.     They 

opened  to  European  activity  the  ancient  Orient,  asleep  for 

centuries,    and  a  new  world.     America,   re- 

Consequences  .     ,  . '      _  .       .  j      i          j 

of  the  new  dis-  peopled  by  European  colonists,  and  placed  at 
coveries.  equal  distance  between  the  opposite  shores  of 

the  old  continent,  was  to  become  the  dwelling  place  of 
powerful  societies  who  were  to  act  their  part  in  the  work  of 
universal  civilization. 

They  changed  completely  the  march  and  the  form  of  the 
world's  commerce.  For  land  commerce,  which  till  then  had 
been  maintained  as  most  conformed  to  the  habits  and  needs 
of  the  peoples,  was  substituted  maritime  commerce.  The 
cities  in  the  interior  of  the  continents  declined,  those  on  the 
coasts  increased,  and  the  commercial  importance  attributed 
to  different  countries  by  reason  of  their  geographical  posi- 
tion found  itself  distributed  in  a  manner  entirely  new.  It 
passed  in  Europe  from  the  countries  situated  on  the  Mediter- 
ranean to  the  countries  situated  on  the  Atlantic,  from  the 
Italians  to  the  Spaniards  and  the  Portuguese,  later  from  the 
latter  to  the  Dutch,  the  English,  and  the  French.  The  more 
commercial  relations  were  multiplied  the  more  the  empire 
of  the  sea  seemed  to  usurp  the  empire  of  the  land;  speedily 
an  island,  lost  in  the  fogs  of  the  West,  became,  thanks  to  its 
trade,  one  of  the  preponderant  powers  of  Europe. 

They  developed  personal  wealth,  which  is  become  the  great 
power  of  modern  society.  While  in  fact  the  Portuguese  were 
creating  prodigious  maritime  commerce,  the  Spaniards  were 


CHAP.  XL]        THE  ECONOMIC  REVOLUTION.  135 

discovering  the  mines  of  Peru  and  Mexico,  and  were  throw- 
ing an  enormous  mass  of  specie  into  European  circulation ; 
122,000,000  kilograms  of  silver  and  3(ooo,ooo  kilograms  of 
gold  between  the  years  1532  and  1848.  "From  1515  to 
1568, "  says  Bodin,  "there  was  more  gold  in  France  than 
could  have  been  brought  together  in  the  two  preceding  cen- 
turies." Thus  the  price  of  everything,  and  in  particular  of 
labor,  increased.  Agriculture,  manufactures,  commerce, 
enjoyed  the  capital  which  they  need,  in  order  to  prosper,  and 
Protestantism  gave  them  in  the  countries,  where  it  was 
established,  more  labor  and  more  hands  to  produce  through 
the  diminution  of  holidays  and  the  shutting  up  of  monas- 
teries. "The  third  part  of  the  kingdom,"  says  a  contem- 
porary, "  was  cleared  for  cultivation  in  twelve  years;  and  for 
one  great  merchant,  found  at  Paris,  Lyons,  or  Rouen,  were 
found  fifty  under  Louis  XII.,  who  made  less  difficulty  in 
going  to  Rome,  Naples,  or  London  than  formerly  to  Lyons 
or  Geneva."  Therefore  as  in  our  day  the  facilities  of  com- 
munication were  multiplying  at  the  same  time  that  produc- 
tion and  general  well-being  increased. 

Then  this  economic  phenomenon  had  also  social  conse- 
quences, and  that  which  is  completed  to-day  began. 

The  Middle  Ages  had  known  only  territorial  wealth,  placed 
entirely  in  the  hands  of  the  lords;  manufactures  and  com- 
merce, facilitated  by  the  abundance  of  capital,  protected 
by  the  good  order  which  the  kings  were  introducing  into  the 
state,  were  about  to  create  in  modern  Europe  personal  prop- 
erty which  was  to  be  in  the  hands  of  the  citizens.  The  first 
was  immovable  and  did  not  pass  from  the  families  that 
held  it;  the  second  was  accessible  to  all  and  remained  in  the 
same  houses  only  on  condition  that  the  factors  which  had 
brought  it  there  should  continue — labor,  good  conduct, 
integrity,  and  intelligence.  The  insurmountable  barrier 
which  formerly  penned  up  each  one  in  his  own  condition  was 
therefore  fallen.  That  also  was  a  sign  of  the  new  times. 

Finally,  as  the  system  of  colonization  of  the  moderns  dif- 
fered greatly  from  that  of  the  ancients,  there  was  produced 
a  peculiar  colonial  policy  which  has  reigned  three  centuries 
and  has  not  yet  everywhere  ceased. 

The  Greek  colony  completely  free  formed  a  new  people, 
who  began  by  making  the  most  of  the  soil  and  quickly  en- 
deavored to  make  the  most  also  of  the  sea,  for  it  is  the  for- 
tune of  well-situated  agricultural  colonies  to  grow  sometimes 


136  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BooK  III. 

slowly,  but  always  sturdily.  Some  of  these  Greek  colonies 
are  still  reckoned  among  the  great  cities  of  the  world.  The 
Roman  colony,  at  once  agricultural  and  military,  but  estab- 
lished in  a  political  end  as  a  means  of  domination,  was  never 
emancipated,  but  remained  the  part  of  a  whole,  prospering 
or  declining  with  all  the  rest. 

The  Portuguese,  who  thought  only  of  commerce,  possessed 
clerks  rather  than  colonists,  factories  instead  of  cities,  a  pros- 
perity rapid  and  brilliant  which  was  of  necessity  ephemeral, 
because  this  greatness  by  no  means  reposed  upon  the  broad 
and  solid  basis  of  soil  firmly  occupied  by  cultivation.  No 
more  did  the  Spaniards  demand  from  their  colonists  an 
agricultural  improvement  of  the  land,  but  a  peculiar  labor 
which  every  day  rendered  necessary  the  assistance  of  the 
mother  state,  and  in  consequence  their  strict  dependence. 

The  English  and  the  French  were  to  develop  another  sort 
of  colonial  establishments,  those  of  the  planters,  where  a 
small  number  of  proprietors  worked  the  land  by  means  of  a 
multitude  of  slaves  in  the  midst  of  perpetual  dangers,  obliging 
them  also  to  rely  upon  the  mother  state. 

We  see  that  the  modern  colonies  were  at  their  origin  con- 
sidered as  making  the  most  of  the  countries  discovered  for 
the  profit  only  of  the  mother  state:  their  exclusive  commerce 
was  accorded  either  to  a  single  city,  like  Lisbon  and  Seville, 
or  to  privileged  companies,  like  those  of  France,  England, 
and  Holland,  which  most  frequently  did  badly  while  at  the 
same  time  hindering  the  colonies  from  doing  well. 

If  the  sea  was  then  furrowed  by  a  larger  number  of  vessels, 

over  the  land  passed  more  numerous  travelers  and  a  greater 

amount  of  merchandise.     The  University  of 

Introduction        _      .       .      .        .  •'      .  •  j         i      j        .    i_ 

of  posts  and  Pans,  imitating  a  very  ancient  idea,  had  estab- 
°ofcksanals  With  lisned  relays  upon  all  the  routes  of  the  kingdom 
to  facilitate  the  correspondence  of  its  students 
with  their  families.  Louis  XI.  understood  how  useful  such 
an  institution  would  be  to  the  government,  and  in  1464  created 
posts  for  the  service  of  the  dispatches  of  the  king  and  the 
Pope ;  later  they  took  charge  of  the  letters  of  private  persons. 
The  institution  appeared  good,  and  it  was  imitated  first  in 
Germany,  shortly  after  in  other  states. 

"The  rivers,"  said  Pascal,  "are  great  highways  which  go  on 
all  alone."  It  is  true,  but  sometimes  they  go  on  badly  either 
over  shallows  or  rapids  and  only  in  certain  directions.  The 
canals  go  everywhere.  The  ancients  had  constructed  only 


CHAP.  XL]        THE  ECONOMIC  REVOLUTION.  137 

canals  on  ground  of  the  same  level ;  they  were  not  at  all  ac- 
quainted with  locks,  by  means  of  which  the  difference  in  the 
level  of  rivers  is  overcome  and  boats  are  made  to  pass  above 
mountains.  Locks  with  chambers  and  reservoirs  of  water 
which  fed  them  were  devised  in  the  fifteenth  century  by  two 
engineers  of  Viterbo  whose  names  remain  unknown.  This 
invention  led  to  the  idea  of  uniting  in  vast  basins  at  the  sum- 
mit level  of  two  mountain  sides  the  waters  of  neighboring 
heights,  so  as  to  feed  the  two  branches  of  the  canal  descend- 
ing in  opposite  directions.  As  early  as  1481  Venice  con- 
structed a  canal  with  locks;  thirty-five  years  later  Francis  I. 
invited  to  France  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  not  less  celebrated  as 
an  engineer  than  as  a  painter.  But  the  wars  excited  by  the 
ambition  of  the  house  of  Austria  and  by  the  religious  quarrels 
during  a  century  delayed  the  improvement  of  this  useful  dis- 
covery. Henry  IV.  was  the  first  to  construct  a  summit  level 
canal,  that  of  Briare  between  the  Seine  and  the  Loire. 

By  posts  and  by  canals  a  more  rapid  means  of  communica- 
tion for  business  and  of  general  transportation  was  afforded. 
By  the  aid  of  bills  of  exchange  and  banks  of  deposit  and 
credit,  capital  circulated  like  commodities;  and  insurance, 
practiced  first  at  Barcelona  and  Florence,  and  later  at 
Bruges,  commenced  the  great  system  of  guarantees  which  to- 
day gives  to  commerce  so  much  boldness  and  security. 

By  all  these  means  as  the  relations  between  citizens  mul- 
tiplied the  state  became  stronger;  and  as  more  bonds  united 
the  peoples  Europe  began  to  form  one  great  body  of  nations, 
all  conjointly  responsible,  which  may  perhaps  later  consti- 
tute one  single  family. 


CHAPTER    XII. 

REVOLUTION    IN    LETTERS,   ARTS,   AND    SCIENCES,    OR 
THE   RENAISSANCE. 


Invention  of  Printing. — Renaissance  of  Letters. — Renaissance  of  Arts. — 
Renaissance  of  Sciences. 


THIS  ardor  on  the  part  of  men  of  action,  which  pressed 

them  to  issue  from  beaten  paths  in  order  to  throw  themselves 

into  untrodden  ways,  was  shared  by  men  of 

printing*!*"1   °       study.     They  also  aspired  after  another  world, 

and  they  sought  it,  not  before  but  behind. 

Like  Columbus  they  believed  they  were  only  going  toward  the 

ancient  continent  and  upon  their  route  they  found  a  new  one. 

Surfeited  with  the  vain  disputes  of  scholasticism  and  the 
quibbles  of  the  schools,  which  a  barbarous  Latin  still  envel- 
oped with  thick  shadows,  fatigued  by  moving  in  emptiness 
and  darkness,  they  hurried  toward  the  pure  light  of  renascent 
antiquity.  The  discovery  of  a  Latin  manuscript  or  of  a 
Greek  statue  caused  the  joy  of  a  victory.  Men  did  not  yet 
create ;  they  were  always  imitating.  The  mind,  too  feeble 
to  walk  alone  by  its  own  strength,  shook  off  the  yoke  of 
Aristotle  and  of  the  hieratic  art  of  the  Middle  Ages  only  to 
place  itself  under  the  discipline  of  new  masters;  an  empire 
more  agreeable,  because  there  was  now  a  divided  dominion, 
which  permitted  freer  ways  and  prepared  for  the  complete 
emancipation  of  the  serfs  of  intelligence. 

However,  only  a  few  superior  men  would  have  profited  by 
the  new  spirit  without  an  admirable  invention,  thanks  to 
which  the  treasures  otherwise  reserved  to  a  limited  number 
could  become  the  possession  of  all. 

In  1436  John  Gutenberg  of  Mentz,  while  residing  at  Stras- 
burg,  perfected  the  processes  of  Lawrence  Coster  of  Haar- 
lem, and  created  the  typograhic  art  by  inventing  movable 
characters.  Fourteen  years  later  he  formed  associations  with 
Faust,  a  banker  of  Mentz,  and  with  Schoeffer,  a  skillful  cal- 

138 


CHAP.  XII.]  THE  RENAISSANCE.  139 

ligraphist,  who  added  other  improvements  to  the  casting  of 
the  characters,  and  probably  invented  the  movable  hand 
mold,  which  is  very  similar  to  that  employed  to-day.  From 
that  time  printing  was  discovered;  the  Letters  of  Indulgence 
and  the  Bible  of  1454  are  its  most  ancient  monuments. 
This  marvelous  art  spread  with  rapidity  in  Germany,  Italy, 
France,  Switzerland,  England,  and  quickly  through  all 
Christian  Europe.  The  price  of  books  suddenly  fell  in  an 
enormous  degree;  the  printers,  who  were  at  the  same  time 
learned  men  of  the  first  rank — the  Aldi  Manutii  in  Italy,  the 
Estiennes  in  France,  and  the  Frobens  in  Switzerland — popu- 
larized by  cheapness  the  literary  masterpieces  of  antiquity, 
of  which  they  gave  editions  as  remarkable  for  purity  of  text 
as  for  typographical  perfection.  It  is  easy  to  appreciate  the 
rapid  progress  of  printing  and  the  sudden  influence  which  it 
exercised  upon  civilization  by  the  fact  that  Josse  Bade  alone 
at  Paris  published  no  less  than  400  works,  the  larger  number 
in  folio.  In  1529,  24,000  copies  of  the  '  'Colloquia"  of  Eras- 
mus were  struck  off,  so  eager  were  the  people  to  learn,  "for 
they  began  to  perceive,"  says  the  Catholic  doctor  Lingard, 
"that  their  ancestors  had  lived  in  mental  slavery  as  well  as 
in  bodily  servitude." 

As  early  as  650  at  Samarcand  and  Bokhara  paper  was  manu- 
factured from  silk.  In  706  Amrou  at  Mecca  substituted 
cotton  for  silk.  This  cotton,  or  Damascus  paper,  as  it  was 
called,  was  known  early  in  Europe.  The  Greeks  imported 
it  into  Southern  Italy,  where  the  Norman  kings  of  Naples 
used  it  frequently  in  their  diplomas.  The  Arabs  had  intro- 
duced it  into  Spain;  but  Spain,  having  much  flax  and  hemp, 
preferred  linen  paper,  which  at  the  thirteenth  century  was 
employed  in  Castile,  and  thence  penetrated  to  France  and 
through  the  rest  of  Europe.  However,  parchment  for  a  long 
time  kept  its  pre-eminence  because  of  its  solidity.  Notaries 
were  forbidden  to  use  any  other  substance  in  their  official 
documents.  Only  at  the  end  of  the  fourteenth  century  was 
the  triumph  of  paper  decided  when  printing,  beginning  its 
career,  needed  a  substance  of  moderate  price  to  receive  the 
impression  of  characters. 

Italy  eagerly  took  possession  of  the  new  invention.     In 
1465  there  were  printers  at   Rome,  in  1469  at 
ofRiettersan         Venice  and  Milan.     Nowhere  else  was  rever- 
ence for  antiquity  so  ardent  and  the  search 
after   manuscripts    so    earnest.      Italy  seemed  desirous  of 


14°  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

escaping  from  the  spectacle  of  her  vices  and  her  degrada- 
tion by  living  again  in  the  ancient  times  whose  remains  she 
piously  disinterred.  In  every  city  schools  were  restored  and 
libraries  founded.  At  Rome  Pope  Eugenius  IV.  re-estab- 
lished the  Roman  University,  and  Nicholas  V.  sent  learned 
men  everywhere  for  the  discovery  of  manuscripts;  he  had 
translations  made  of  the  Greek  historians  and  of  many  fathers 
of  the  Church,  and  he  founded  the  library  of  the  Vatican. 
At  Naples  Alphonso  the  Magnanimous  protected  Lorenzo 
Valla  and  Pontano,  the  restorers  of  the  Neapolitan  Academy, 
and  he  demanded  nothing  from  Lorenzo  de  Medici  as  price 
of  reconciliation  save  a  manuscript  of  Titus  Livius.  At 
Florence  and  Pisa,  Cosmo  and  Lorenzo  the  Magnificent 
commenced  the  Mediceo-Laurentian  library,  afterward  so 
famous,  and  offered  an  honorable  asylum  to  the  learned  men 
of  all  lands.  Cosmo,  the  founder  of  the  Academia  della 
Crusca,  charged  Marcilo  Ficino  with  translating  and  ex- 
plaining Plato,  and  with  commencing  against  Aristotle,  the 
philosophical  oracle  of  the  Middle  Ages,  a  war  which  was 
to  aid  in  the  enfranchisement  of  the  human  mind.  Genoa, 
called  La  Superba  because  of  its  marble  palaces,  remained 
under  foreign  domination  and  outside  this  grand  movement, 
but  Venice  participated  in  it.  Not  far  from  the  ancient  Uni- 
versity of  Padua,  rose  in  1470  that  of  Venice. 

The  descendants  of  the  turbulent  barons  were  changing 
their  fortresses  into  cabinets  of  study  and  forgetting  their 
arms  for  their  books.  Rome  saw  the  lord  Pic  de  la  Miradola, 
having  become  paladin  of  science,  sustain  against  every 
comer  theses  in  all  languages  and  upon  all  subjects.  The 
somber  Ludovico  il  Moro  himself  at  Milan  protected  artists 
and  learned  men.  He  restored  the  University  of  Pavia,  he 
encouraged  the  first  appearance  of  Bramante;  the  great 
Leonardo  da  Vinci,  whom  he  had  appointed  director  of  the 
Academy  of  Painting  and  Architecture  of  Milan,  sculptured 
for  him  an  equestrian  statue,  which  the  soldiers  of  Louis 
XII.  broke  in  pieces;  he  also  painted  in  one  of  the  convents 
of  the  city  that  "  Holy  Supper"  which  is,  or  rather  was,  his 
masterpiece.  The  secondary  states  obeyed  the  general  im- 
pulse: the  Gonzagas  at  Mantua,  the  Montefeltris  at  Urbino, 
and  especially  the  illustrious  house  of  Este  at  Ferrara.  But 
among  all  these  glorious  names  we  must  reserve  a  special 
place  for  those  of  Julius  II.  and  of  Leo  X.  The  first  in 
the  midst  of  his  negotiations  and  wars  found  time  to  attract 


CHAP.  XII.]  THE  RENAISSANCE.  14! 

and  retain  at  his  court  a  host  of  men  eminent  by  their  eru- 
dition, their  knowledge  of  the  beautiful,  and  their  genius. 
One  thing  suffices  for  his  renown:  he  commenced  St.  Peter's 
at  Rome,  and  charged  Michael  Angelo  with  the  erection  of 
the  cupola.  "Belles  lettres,"  said  he,  "are  silver  to  plebeians, 
gold  to  nobles,  and  diamonds  to  princes."  The  day  when 
the  Laocoon  was  found  in  the  baths  of  Titus  he  had  the  bells 
rung  in  all  the  churches  of  Rome.  The  second,  sprung  from 
the  family  of  the  Medici,  was  much  more  prince  of  letters  and 
artists  than  pontiff  of  Christians.  "To  favor  the  progress  of 
letters,"  said  he  himself,  "is  an  important  part  of  pontifical 
duties."  Raphael  painted  for  him  the  frescoes  of  the 
Vatican,  Michael  Angelo  those  of  the  Sixtine  Chapel,  and 
he  paid  five  hundred  sequins  for  a  manuscript  copy  of  the 
first  five  books  of  Titus  Livius,  which  he  hastened  to  have 
printed.  Sometimes  his  name  is  given  to  this  century;  it  is 
a  flattery,  but  not  an  injustice. 

This  revival  of  taste  for  ancient  erudition  was  among  the 
Latins  unhappily  not  the  revival  of  masculine  virtues  and  the 
strong  thoughts  of  Rome  and  Athens.  Thus  Italian  litera- 
ture, more  learned  in  the  sixteenth  than  in  the  fourteenth 
century,  was  less  original  and  less  virile.  The  authority  of 
Aristotle  was  thrown  off  indeed,  thanks  to  the  perusal  of  his 
eternal  rival  Plato,  whose  works  were  edited  in  1513  at  Venice 
by  the  Aldi,  but  nothing  whatsoever  in  philosophy  was 
created.  From  ancient  historians  was  borrowed  the  art  of 
grouping  facts  and  of  interrupting  the  narrative  by  conven- 
tional discourses;  but  Italy  formed  neither  a  Herodotus  nor 
a  Tacitus.  Geography  was  discovered  in  Ptolemy,  botany 
in  Dioscorides,  medicine  in  Galen  and  Hippocrates,  but  no 
contribution  was  made  to  these  sciences.  In  a  word,  the 
depths  of  Italian  nationality  and  genius  gave  birth  to  noth- 
ing as  in  the  century  of  Dante. 

Without  speaking  of  Sannazzro  and  his  "Piscatory  Idyls," 
of  Vida,  who  sung  of  chess  and  silkworms  in  so  beautiful 
Latin  before  writing  his  Christiad,  how  could  one  find  any 
personal  inspiration,  however  small,  in  the  Ciceronian 
Bembo,  that  favorite  cardinal  of  Leo  X.  who  did  not  listen  to 
sermons  because  their  language  was  so  poor,  and  who  swore 
per  deos  immortalis,  who  called  the  Virgin  Dea  Lauretana, 
and  believed  that,  man  being  henceforth  unable  to  create 
anything  new  in  literature,  there  was  hereafter  only  one  thing 
to  do  :  in  Latin  to  imitate  Cicero,  in  Italian  to  imitate 


I42  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

Petrarch.  Sadoleto,  at  least  to  this  reverence  for  Cicero, 
added  that  of  virtue  and  a  spirit  of  toleration  which  makes 
his  memory  more  fragrant  to  us  even  than  do  his  beautiful 
Latin  letters. 

At  this  epoch  Italy  had  only  two  great  writers,  Ariosto 
and  Machiavelli,  and  a  celebrated  historian,  Guicciardini ;  a 
number  of  stylish  artists  and  not  a  single  work  of  powerful 
originality,  because  the  imagination  and  the  mind  were  never 
at  the  service  of  grand  ideas  or  of  elevated  and  pure  senti- 
ments. The  "  Orlando  Furioso  "  was  published  in  1515,  the 
very  year  when,  at  the  expense  of  Italy,  Francis  I.  gained  the 
battle  of  Marignano.  Count  Boiardo  had  recently  written 
the  "Orlando  Inamorato,"  where  the  details  of  chivalrous 
poems  were  still  gravely  taken  in  a  serious  fashion.  Ariosto 
gave  the  antithesis.  His  semi-heroic,  semi-comic  poem, 
contradictory  of  history  and  of  moral  truth,  is  a  masterpiece 
of  imagination  and  grace,  but  in  truth  when  one  thinks  in 
the  midst  of  what  circumstances  Ariosto  imagined  all  his 
fairy  scenes  one  is  tempted  to  repeat  the  words  of  the  Car- 
dinal of  Este,  "Ah!  Master  Ariosto,  where  have  you  found 
so  much  fiddle  faddle?"  An  incident  paints  the  spirit  of  the 
time:  Bembo,  the  friend  of  Ariosto,  wished  him  to  write  his 
poem  in  Latin  verse.  "I  prefer,"  replied  the  poet,  "to  be 
the  first  among  the  Tuscan  poets  rather  than  hardly  the 
second  among  the  Latins."  And  he  was  right:  this  "riddle 
faddle"  has  survived  by  that  which  makes  books  survive — by 
its  style. 

It  is  to  be  noted  as  characteristic  of  morals  rather  than  of 
literature  that  Boccaccio  had  had  a  numerous  progeny  of 
story-tellers  more  licentious  than  himself.  This  immorality 
gained  possession  of  the  theater  and  there  increased,  for  the 
eyes  saw  what  the  ears  alone  heard.  The  first  two  modern 
comedies,  the  "  Calandra"  of  Cardinal  Bibbiena  and  the 
"Mandragola"  of  Machiavelli,  which  were  represented  at 
the  pontifical  court,  are  sullied  by  those  obscenities  which  one 
still  finds  in  the  epic  of  Ariosto;  and  Aretino  was  by  Julius 
II.  made  Knight  of  St.  Peter  while  waiting  to  be  appointed 
cardinal.  The  characters  the  most  strongly  tempered  gave 
themselves  up  to  indulgence.  Thus  Machiavelli  first  com- 
promised his  vigorous  mind  by  the  most  trivial  productions, 
and  when  personal  suffering  had  awakened  in  his  soul  the 
sentiment  of  the  sorrows  of  his  country  he  began  his  political 
works  by  "  II  Principe,"  a  book  which  one  would  take  as  an 


CHAP.  XII.]  THE  RENAISSANCE.  143 

act  of  despair.  He  there  reduces  to  a  theory,  in  a  style  as  cold 
and  direct  as  the  theory,  that  policy  of  egotism  and  of  cruelty 
which  made  of  perfidy  an  art,  of  assassination  a  means,  and 
which  immolated  to  the  end  proposed  all  ideas  of  integrity. 
Let  us  condemn  this  pernicious  book  "which  taught  to  rifle 
the  rich  of  their  goods,  the  poor  of  their  honor,  all  of  their 
liberty,"  but  let  us  recognize  that  it  accuses  the  century 
for  which  it  was  composed  as  well  as  the  hand  which  wrote 
it:  century  of  Leo  X.,  who  gave  a  safe  conduct  to  a  cardinal 
and  had  him  slain  on  his  arrival;  of  Caesar  Borgia,  who 
deceived  and  poisoned  the  lords  of  the  Romagna;  of  Ferdi- 
nand of  Naples,  who  allured  his  nobles  to  a  festival  and  there 
butchered  them;  of  Ferdinand  the  Catholic,  who  counted 
it  an  honor  to  be  perfidious ;  of  those,  finally,  who  organized 
the  abominable  treachery  of  St.  Bartholomew.  Success  was 
everything,  morality  nothing.  Montaigne  himself  found  vice 
necessary.  "The  public  welfare,"  he  dares  to  say,  "re- 
quires treason,  falsehood,  and  massacre."  And  he  is  not 
without  esteem  for  "those  citizens,  more  vigorous  and  less 
timid,  who  sacrifice  their  honor  and  their  conscience  as  the 
ancients  sacrificed  their  life  for  the  salvation  of  their 
country." 

Behold  the  world  as  it  was  when  issuing  from  the  Middle 
Ages,  and  which  we  have  had  to  purify! 

At  this  epoch  only  three  countries  thought  and  produced: 
Italy  was  the  first,  France  the  second,  then  came  Germany. 
As  to  England,  she  was  cicatrizing  the  wounds  of  the  War  of 
the  Roses ;  Spain  had  her  eyes  turned  less  upon  antiquity 
than  toward  America  and  its  mines,  toward  Italy  and  the 
Netherlands  with  their  rich  cities  and  their  fertile  fields 
where  the  bands  of  Charles  V.  so  loved  to  war  and  pillage. 

The  French  language  had  simplicity  and  forcible  expres- 
sions, but  it  lacked  amplitude,  elevation,  clearness.  If 
imagination,  good  sense,  Gallic  gayety,  sparkled  in  its  writ- 
ings of  prose  and  verse,  triviality,  diffuseness,  bad  taste, 
disfigured  its  best  books.  But  antiquity  once  refound,  the 
writers  drank  at  this  fruitful  source,  and  the  genius  of 
France,  tempering  itself  better  than  that  of  any  other  mod- 
ern nation,  acquired  that  high  and  national  tone,  that  de- 
corum, that  limpid  transparency,  which  have  won  for  it  the 
pacific  empire  of  Europe. 

Francis  I.,  who  has  been  called  the  Father  of  Letters,  did 
not  create  the  movement,  which  was  produced  of  itself,  but 


144  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

it  was  aided  by  him.  The  venerable  University  of  Paris  with 
its  faculty  of  theology,  the  Sorbonne,  could  not  change  its 
spirit  and  method.  On  the  model  of  the  Italian  academies 
and  by  the  advice  of  the  learned  Bude  the  king  founded  in 
1530  an  establishment  entirely  for  the  laity,  the  College  of 
the  Three  Languages,  or  the  College  of  France.  Hebrew, 
Greek,  Latin,  medicine,  mathematics,  everything  that  was 
new  or  that  carved  out  for  itself  new  ways,  was  there  taught 
gratuitously.  The  Hebraist  Vatable,  the  Hellenist  Danes, 
the  mathematician  and  orientalist  Postel,  the  learned  Tur- 
nebe,  and  the  fluent  Lambin  saw  flocking  to  their  able  teach- 
ing those  pupils  to  whom  the  university  dealt  out  knowledge 
so  parsimoniously.  Francis  I.  did  not  create  the  royal  print- 
ing house,  which  dates  only  from  Louis  XIII.  in  1640,  but 
he  caused  to  be  engraved  and  cast,  according  to  the  beautiful 
forms  of  the  Venetian  types  of  Aldus  Manutius,  the  characters 
of  Garamond,  who  by  his  order  intrusted  them  to  the  most 
distinguished  printers,  called  royal  printers — to  the  Estienne, 
for  example,  that  they  might  serve  in  the  beautiful  editions 
published  by  these  private  establishments.  He  bought 
manuscripts  of  ancient  authors  in  Italy,  Greece,  and  Asia 
to  increase  the  growing  wealth  of  the  royal  library,  and  he 
had  a  great  number  edited. 

French  erudition  then  began  those  great  works  which 
placed  it  during  three  centuries  at  the  head  of  European 
science.  With  Cujas,  Pithou,  Denis  Godefroy,  Doneau, 
Dumoulin,  jurisprudence  shone  with  a  splendor  which  was 
equaled  nowhere  else  and  which  has  not  been  eclipsed.  In 
learned  letters  Danes,  Postel,  the  great  Ciceronian  Dolet, 
burned  alive  at  thirty-six,  the  first  Hellenist  of  Europe, 
Bude,  Lefebvre  d'Etaples,  the  Estiennes,  dynasty  of 
printers,  more  able  than  the  best  scholars  of  the  time,  pub- 
lished a  multitude  of  learned  books  which  revealed  the  twin 
antiquities,  sacred  and  profane,  from  which  our  civilization 
has  sprung. 

In  letters  properly  so  called  one  can  distinguish  in  this 
century,  as  it  were,  four  groups  of  writers:  at  its  commence- 
ment Marot  and  his  elegant  badinage,  Rabelais  with  his 
wine-seasoned  and  audacious  fancy ;  at  its  close  Mathurin 
Regnier,  the  satirist,  all  three  heirs  of  the  old  Gallic  genius; 
at  the  middle  Ronsard  and  the  pleiad  of  poets  "whose 
muse  in  French  spoke  Greek  and  Latin";  beside  these 
during  the  religious  wars  Amyot  and  Montaigne,  fervent 


CHAP.  XII.]  THE  RENAISSANCE.  145 

worshipers  of  antiquity,  but  who,  unlike  the  school  of  Ron- 
sard,  did  not  sacrifice  to  it  the  national  language;  finally,  be- 
tween the  sixteenth  century  which  was  finishing  and  the 
seventeenth  which  began,  Malherbe,  the  poet  of  Henry  IV., 
who  regulated  like  his  master  the  unrestrained  movement  of 
the  preceding  age,  and  prepared  the  calm  grandeur  of  that 
which  was  to  follow.  In  all,  two  books  which  have  remained 
and  which  the  most  delicate  still  read,  the  "Essais"  and  "Gar- 
gantua, "  without  reckoning  many  pages  of  Amyot,  many 
pieces  of  Malherbe,  many  verses  of  Mathuriri  Regnier,  and 
the  entire  "Satire  Menippee."  Calvin  and  d'Aubigne  have 
a  place  apart,  the  latter  for  his  "Memoires"  and  his  "Trag- 
iques,"  the  former  for  his  "Christian  Institutes." 

Germany  did  not  yet  speak  its  own  language.  At  least  it 
is  in  Latin  that  its  men  of  learning,  even  of  intellect,  like 
Ulrich  von  Hutten,  wrote.  The  most  illustrious  was  then 
Erasmus  of  Rotterdam  (1467-1536).  He  had  this  pecul- 
iarity that,  in  the  midst  of  the  effervescence  of  the  sixteenth 
century  which  so  radically  affected  character,  he  was  a 
cold  and  sarcastic  man  who  a  century  later  would  have  been 
a  skeptic  if  he  were  not  one  already,  and  who  sacrificed 
nothing  to  those  ideas  to  which  then  others  sacrificed  all.  A 
choir  boy  when  nine  years  old;  a  canon  at  seventeen,  after- 
ward canceling  his  vows;  a  student  at  the  college  of  Mon- 
taigu  at  Paris,  where  to  gain  his  livelihood  he  gave  lessons  to 
an  English  gentleman,  who  afterward  attracted  him  to  Eng- 
land; shortly  after  at  Boulogne,  where  he  received  the  cap  of 
doctor  in  theology;  at  Venice  with  Aldus  Manutius;  then 
again  in  England  at  the  house  of  Chancellor  Thomas  More; 
sought  after  by  the  sovereigns  Henry  VIII.,  Leo  X.,  Adrian 
VI.,  Francis  I.,  who  in  vain  had  him  tendered  by  the  learned 
Bude  the  direction  of  the  recently  founded  College  of  France, 
and  in  the  midst  of  this  court  of  monarchs  preserving  an 
independence  skillfully  adjusted  to  alarm  no  one — such  was 
Erasmus.  "Literary  people, "  said  he,  "resemble  the  great 
figured  tapestries  of  Flanders,  which  produce  effect  only- 
when  seen  from  a  distance."  From  this  sort  of  intellect  and 
of  wit  he  has  been  called  the  Voltaire  of  his  time.  No  writer 
in  fact  exercised  at  this  epoch  a  more  extended  empire.  His 
epigrams  against  the  ignorance,  the  libertinage,  and  the  glut- 
tony of  the  monks  and  his  attacks  against  indulgences, 
seemed  to  indicate  him  to  the  Reformers  as  one  of  them- 
selves. But  he  was  too  prudent  to  engage  in  so  ardent  a 


1 46  RE  VOL  UTION  IN  IN  TERES  TS.         [BOOK  III. 

fight.  "Luther,"  said  he,  "has  given  us  a  salutary  doctrine 
and  very  excellent  counsels;  would  that  he  had  not  destroyed 
their  effect  by  unpardonable  faults.  But  even  if  there  were 
nothing  to  criticise  in  his  writings  I  should  never  have  felt 
disposed  to  die  for  the  truth.  All  men  have  not  received 
the  courage  necessary  for  martyrdom;  had  I  been  put  to 
the  test  I  exceedingly  fear  I  should  have  done  like  St. 
Peter."  He  remained  therefore  outside  the  party  of  "sedi- 
tious truths,"  entirely  devoted  to  his  favorite  authors,  a  lover 
of  pure  language  and  of  beautiful  Latin.  '  'Erasmus,"  cried 
Luther,  "is  Erasmus  and  by  no  means  anything  else."  His 
principal  works  are  the  "Praise  of  Folly,"  his  "Adages,"  and 
his  "Colloquies, "  satirical  dialogues  in  the  style  of  Lucian 
where  the  clergy  and  the  monks  have  especially  to  suffer.  But 
over  the  organization  of  studies  he  had  a  predominant  influ- 
ence. It  is  he  who  caused  to  triumph  the  present  system 
of  pronunciation  of  ancient  Greek,  and  who  banished  from 
instruction  the  clumsy  and  barbarous  forms  of  scholasticism. 
He  attacked  the  new  pedants  no  less  than  the  ancient;  in  his 
"Ciceronianus"  he  turns  into  derision  those  purists  so  scru- 
pulous for  the  expression  and  so  careless  of  the  thought.  In 
1516  he  had  published  the  first  Greek  edition  of  the  New 
Testament. 

Another  personage  was  claimed  by  the  Netherlands,  the 
Spaniard  Vives,  who  was  a  professor  at  Louvain  and  Bruges, 
and  who  was  almost  peer  of  Bude  and  Erasmus. 

In  Germany  the  literature  of  the  Middle  Ages  continued 
in  the  Meistersanger  schools  which  still  abounded  in  Swa- 
bia  and  Franconia.  At  Nuremberg  in  1558  there  were  no 
less  than  250  mastersingers  who  met  in  the  choir  of  the 
cathedral  after  divine  service.  The  most  celebrated  was 
the  cobbler  Hans  Sachs,  who  wrote  10,840  verses.  The 
"Narrenschiff, "  or  "Bark  of  Fools,"  by  the  Strasburger 
Sebastian  Brandt,  and  its  continuation  by  one  of  his  com- 
patriots, Thomas  Murner,  had  an  immense  and  somewhat 
lasting  success,  which,  however,  could  not  extend  beyond  the 
sixteenth  century.  Despite  the  fecundity  of  Hans  Sachs 
this  popular  literature  was  dying.  Reverence  on  the  other 
hand  for  learned  letters  was  rapidly  extending,  and  the 
Renaissance  counted  a  large  number  of  German  Ciceronians: 
Reuchlin,  who  introduced  into  France  the  study  of  Hebrew, 
and  who  was  the  master  of  Melancthon;  Hegius,  the  mas- 
ter of  Erasmus;  Celtes;  Beatus  Rhenanus;  Dalberg,  who 


CHAP.  XII.]  THE  RENAISSANCE.  14? 

founded  at  Heidelberg  the  first  German  academy,  and  a 
library  which  was  the  finest  in  Europe  until  the  Thirty 
Years' War;  Hutten,  the  author  of'Litterge  Obscurorum 
Virorum"  and  poet  laureate  of  the  Emperor  Maximilian; 
and  a  crowd  of  others,  in  fine,  who  would  have  made  Ger- 
many enter  under  full  sail  into  the  new  current  of  modern 
civilization  if  one  of  them,  Luther,  had  not  let  loose  upon 
his  country  the  theological  tempests  which  suddenly  arrested 
the  intellectual  outburst,  and  brought  about  what  historians 
have  called  the  iron  age  of  German  literature. 

Far  inferior  to  the  ancients  in  letters,  the  Italy  of  the  six- 
teenth century  equaled  or  surpassed  them  in  the  arts.  The 
pointed  architecture  had  no  longer  the  severe 
ofRaerts'SSance  grandeur  characterizing  that  of  the  thirteenth 
century.  In  the  fifteenth  reigned  the  flam- 
boyant Gothic  where  architectural  lines  were  wrested  in 
countless  windings.  It  was  dazzling;  it  was  neither  simple 
nor  grand.  In  France  the  effort  was  made  to  reject  the 
ancient  style;  they  distorted  it,  but  introduced  nothing  else. 
Italy,  where  pointed  architecture  never  reached  the  perfection 
which  it  attained  beyond  the  mountains,  early  demanded 
architectural  inspiration  from  antiquity;  at  the  close  of  the 
fourteenth  century  Christian  temples  were  erected  for 
which  they  endeavored  to  borrow  from  the  Greeks  the 
exquisite  purity  of  their  lines  and  from  the  artists  of  the 
Middle  Ages  the  religious  expression  which  they  had  so 
well  attained. 

The  Florentine  Brunelleschi  was  the  real  creator  of  this 
new  architecture.  He  drew  the  ancient  Greek  orders  from 
oblivion;  for  the  pointed  substituted  the  rounded  arch,  and 
for  the  tortured  lines  of  the  flowery  Gothic  the  straight  line 
of  Greek  temples  or  the  elegant  curve  of  the  Roman  dome. 
His  cupola  of  the  cathedral  of  Florence  precedes  by  a  cen- 
tury that  of  Michael  Angelo  at  St.  Peter's  in  Rome,  and  is 
fully  as  grand.  In  face  of  the  elaborate  ornamentation  of 
the  Venetian  artists  his  pupils  preserved  in  the  new  system 
the  stern  sobriety  which  Brunelleschi  had  given  it.  But  it 
was  reserved  to  Bramante,  the  uncle  of  Raphael,  to  carry  the 
architecture  of  the  Renaissance  to  the  utmost  degree  of  per- 
fection. The  palace  of  the  Chancery  and  the  court  of  the 
Vatican  are  models.  It  was  Bramante  whom  Pope  Julius 
II.  intrusted  with  designing  the  plan  of  St.  Peter's  at 
Rome.  Arrested  by  death,  he  had  as  successor  Michael 


I48  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

Angelo,  who  borrowed  from  him  the  idea  of  the  celebrated 
cupola. 

In  the  thirteenth  century  Nicolas  and  Andrea  of  Pisa 
had  thrown  off  the  yoke  of  conventional  art  and  of  Byzantine 
tradition,  and  had  created  Italian  sculpture.  The  pulpits  of 
Pisa  and  Siena  and  the  tomb  of  St.  Dominic  at  Bologna 
are  examples.  Lorenzo  Ghiberti  in  the  fifteenth  (1378- 
1455)  placed  himself  in  the  first  rank  by  his  two  doors  of  the 
Baptistery  of  Florence,  "worthy  of  being  placed  at  the  en- 
trance of  paradise,"  said  Michael  Angelo.  Beside  this  great 
artist,  Donatello  (1383-1466),  less  elevated  in  style,  more 
energetic  in  expression,  founded  the  Florentine  school  of 
sculpture,  of  which  Andrea  Verocchio  (1432-88)  and  Alex- 
andro  Leopardi  were  the  illustrious  representatives,  and 
which  has  as  its  principal  characteristic  the  exact  and  studied 
imitation  of  the  model,  or  naturalism,  as  it  has  been  called. 
The  masterpiece  of  Donatello  was  a  statue  of  St.  Mark  of 
such  fidelity  that  after  having  long  gazed  upon  it  Michael 
Angelo  exclaimed,  "Mark,  why  dost  thou  not  speak  to  me?" 
Their  contemporary,  Luca  della  Robbia,  almost  all  of  whose 
works  are  made  of  a  varnished  baked  earth  which  resembles 
pottery,  preserved  the  simplicity  of  the  sculpture  of  the 
Middle  Ages  while  giving  it  an  almost  antique  purity  of  style. 

Ornamental  sculpture,  chained  to  tradition  before  the 
Renaissance,  became  with  Lombardi  and  Benvenuto  Cellini, 
the  famous  goldsmith,  an  admirable  art  at  the  same  time  as  a 
flourishing  industry. 

The  superiority  of  the  Italians  over  the  Greeks  in  sculp- 
ture and  architecture  is  easily  contestable;  not  so  in  painting. 
In  the  thirteenth  century  Giotto  (1276-1366),  friend  of 
Dante  and  of  Cimabue,  last  painter  of  the  Byzantine  school, 
created  a  new  system.  More  truth  in  expression  and  dra- 
pery, more  correctness  and  exactness  in  the  design,  a  begin- 
ning of  form,  passion,  and  grandeur  united  to  grace  in  the 
composition — such  are  the  qualities  which  during  a  century 
made  of  Giotto  the  greatest  painter  of  Italy. 

Giottesque  painting  was  dominant  until  the  early  years 
of  the  fifteenth  century.  At  this  period  two  important 
modifications  in  material  processes  brought  about  a  veritable 
revolution  in  the  practice  even  of  the  art.  On  the  one  hand 
principles  of  linear  perspective,  taught  by  Ucello  (died  1472), 
were  applied;  to  this  the  mathematician  Manetti  contrib- 
uted; on  the  other  hand  the  brothers  Van  Eyck  of  Bruges 


CHAP.  XII.]  THE  RENAISSANCE.  149 

(1370-1450)  perfected  the  processes  of  painting  in  oil  to  such 
a  degree  that  painting  in  distemper  was  abandoned,  and 
fresco  was  employed  only  to  decorate  the  walls  of  great 
monuments. 

Italy  counted  then  three  great  schools:  the  naturalist 
school  of  Florence,  founded  by  Masaccio  (1402-43),  who 
finally  ceased  to  observe  typical  characters  or  Byzantine 
formalism,  which  Giotto  still  preserved;  the  Umbrian 
school,  religious  and  spiritualistic,  which  had  at  its  head 
Perugino;  finally,  the  colorist  school  at  Venice,  whose  chief 
was  Giovanni  Bellini. 

At  this  moment  when  study  of  nature  and  knowledge  of 
design  had  already  made  great  progress,  but  when  it  was  still 
left  to  unite  grace  to  the  design,  harmony  to  color,  and 
especially  the  beau-ideal  to  the  truth  of  forms,  there  ap- 
peared six  men  of  extraordinary  genius,  the  greatest  painters 
of  Italy  and  of  all  time — Leonardo  da  Vinci,  Michael  Angelo, 
Correggio,  Giorgione,  Titian,  and  the  divine  Raphael. 

If  the  creative  power  of  the  Renaissance  and  of  the  six- 
teenth century  existed  anywhere  it  was  in  Michael  Angelo 
Buonarotti.  He  was  born  in  1474  near  Arezzo  of  an  illustri- 
ous patrician  family,  and  showed  from  boyhood  so  strong  an 
inclination  for  drawing  that  it  triumphed  over  the  aristocratic 
prejudices  of  his  family.  The  men  of  that  age  embraced 
everything.  He  was  an  incomparable  sculptor,  a  great  archi- 
tect, though  stormy  and  incorrect,  a  painter  of  the  first  rank, 
an  eminent  engineer;  charged  with  fortifying  besieged  Flor- 
ence, he  defended  it  twelve  months.  He  was  well  versed 
in  anatomy,  and  with  his  artist  hand  dissecting  the  dead, 
acquired  that  profound  acquaintance  with  the  internal  struc- 
ture of  the  human  body  and  with  the  play  of  the  muscles 
which  enabled  him  to  give  so  much  relief  to  his  representa- 
tions of  the  human  form  and  to  join  the  beautiful  to  the  true 
by  the  alliance  of  art  and  science.  Nature,  so  forgotten  by 
the  artists  of  the  Middle  Ages,  resumed  her  empire;  the 
powerful  originality  of  Michael  Angelo  was  derived  from 
the  fact  that  he  studied  her  face.  He  could  when  he  wished 
so  counterfeit  the  antique  that  others  would  mistake,  but  he 
did  not  let  himself  be  dominated  by  it.  He  is  the  Corneille 
of  sculpture  through  the  exceeding  character  of  strength 
and  grandeur  which  he  gave  to  the  works  wrought  by  his 
hands. 

He  had  as  his  master  Domenico  del  Ghirlandajo,  whose 


150  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

cold,  characterless,  formal  painting,  if  I  may  so  speak,  he 
soon  surpassed.  First  protected  by  the  Medici,  he  lost  that 
support  when  a  revolution  drove  them  from  Florence.  Then 
he  came  to  Rome,  where  Julius  II.  intrusted  him  with  the 
construction  of  his  mausoleum.  He  outlined  a  colossal 
plan  of  which  only  a  few  figures  were  executed;  one  of  them 
is  his  '  'Moses,"  seated  and  holding  the  table  of  the  law.  He 
was  austere  in  morals,  of  extreme  sobriety,  stoical  in  char- 
acter, the  most  of  the  time  alone  in  the  presence  of  living  or 
dead  nature  and  of  his  mighty  meditations.  His  pride  made 
him  quit  Rome  because  one  day  the  door  of  the  pontiff  was 
closed  to  him;  for  a  long  time  he  resisted  prayers  and  men- 
aces. He  returned,  however,  and  made  for  Julius  II.,  the 
conqueror  of  Bologna,  the  statue  which  seemed  rather  to 
chastise  than  to  bless  the  city.  The  labor  of  decorating  the 
vault  of  the  Sixtine  Chapel  with  frescoes  was  then  intrusted 
to  him;  this  was  a  snare  of  his  enemies,  especially  of  Bra- 
mante,  who  through  jealousy  endeavored  to  set  up  against 
him  the  already  celebrated  Raphael.  Michael  Angelo  was 
ignorant  of  fresco;  he  called  for  fresco  painters,  made  them 
work  before  him,  then  shut  himself  up  in  the  Sixtine  Chapel, 
of  which  he  carried  the  keys  with  him,  and  there  executed, 
all  alone,  in  twenty  months  those  prodigious  figures  of  proph- 
ets and  sibyls  which  were  a  revelation  of  the  grandiose  in  art. 
Leo  X.,  Clement  VII.,  Paul  III.,  protected  him  in  turn. 
His  principal  works  in  this  period  were  the  mausoleum  of 
Julius -II.  as  it  exists  to-day  in  the  church  of  St.  Peter  in 
Vinculis;  the  tombs  of  Lorenzo  and  of  Guiliano  de'  Medici 
at  Florence,  where  "Night"  was  represented,  so  celebrated 
under  the  form  of  a  sleeping  woman;  the  grand  fresco  of 
the  "Last  Judgment,"  where  lived  again  the  genius  of  Dante, 
so  worthy  of  inspiring  Michael  Angelo;  finally,  that  immor- 
tal church  of  St.  Peter  which  he  completed,  employing  the 
plans  of  Bramante  indeed,  but  so  modifying  them  that  it  has 
remained  one  of  his  chief  titles  to  glory.  It  was  also  one  of 
his  last  works.  He  died  at  the  age  of  ninety,  in  1564,  a  pa- 
triarch of  modern  art.  The  French  Museum  of  Sculpture 
possesses  his  "Two  Captives,"  but  his  greatest  painting, 
"Resurrection  of  Lazarus,"  is  at  London. 

Michael  Angelo  was  also  a  poet,  and  a  great  poet,  as  if  he 
had  wished  to  leave  no  branch  of  art  untouched  by  his  genius. 
He  composed  many  sonnets,  some  of  them  magnificent. 
Strozzi  had  written  below  his  exquisite  statue  of  "Night": 


CHAP.  XII.]  THE  RENAISSANCE.  151 

"Night,  whom  thou  seest  sleeping  in  so  exquisite  an  atti- 
tude, has  been  sculptured  by  an  angel  in  this  stone.  Al- 
though she  sleeps,  she  lives.  Dost  thou  doubt?  Wake 
her:  she  will  speak."  This  was  after  the  great  disaster  of 
Italy;  the  patriotic  soul  of  Michael  Angelo  was  full  of  those 
painful  recollections.  He  replied  to  Strozzi  in  the  name  of 
Night:  "I  am  content  to  sleep;  I  prefer  to  continue  stone 
as  long  as  the  days  of  misfortune  and  shame  endure.  Not 
to  see,  not  to  feel,  is  to  me  a  great  advantage.  Therefore 
do  not  wake  me.  In  pity  speak  low." 

Leonardo  da  Vinci  was  born  in  1452  at  the  castle  of  Vinci 
near  Florence.  His  special  taste  for  painting,  without  caus- 
ing him  to  neglect  other  branches  of  knowledge,  decided 
his  family  to  place  him  in  the  studio  of  Andrea  Verocchio. 
Protected  by  Ludovico  Sforza,  he  was  also  protected  later 
on  by  Louis  XII.,  become  master  of  Milan,  by  Leo  X.,  and 
finally  by  Francis  I.,  who  invited  him  to  France  and  lodged 
him  in  the  castle  of  Clou  near  Amboise,  where  he  died.  In 
point  of  time,  therefore,  he  precedes  Michael  Angelo ;  the 
latter  was  making  his  first  appearance  when  Leonardo  was 
already  illustrious.  His  influence  assuredly  did  not  have  so 
grand  a  reach ;  he  did  not,  like  the  painter  of  the  Sixtine 
Chapel,  revolutionize  the  spirit  of  art;  but  like  him  he  prac- 
ticed and  recommended  the  study  of  nature.  One  day  when 
he  was  to  paint  a  joyous  scene  he  invited  his  friends  to  a  re- 
past and  by  humorous  stories  made  them  laugh  immoderately, 
thus  gathering  unknown  to  them  all  the  features  of  his  paint- 
ing. The  practice  of  painting  owes  him  much.  One  day 
Leo  X.  found  him  occupied  with  inventing  a  new  kind  of 
varnish.  He  carried  to  a  high  degree  the  art  of  composi- 
tion, the  science  of  light  and  shade  and  that  of  color,  and 
wrote  a  treatise  upon  painting  on  which  all  the  great  painters 
have  meditated.  His  masterpiece,  the  "Holy  Supper"  ("II 
Cenacolo"),  at  the  convent  of  Santa  Maria  delle  Grazie  at 
Milan,  is  unfortunately  greatly  damaged.  The  color  of  his 
"Joconde"  (Madonna  Lisa  del  Gioconde),  at  the  Museum  of 
the  Louvre,  has  also  been  badly  maltreated  by  time.  We 
have  of  him  a  "Saint  John  the  Baptist,"  a  "Holy  Family" 
which  is  not  worth  so  much  perhaps  as  that  of  the  same 
painter  now  found  at  Madrid,  and  the  portrait  of  the  "Belle 
Ferroniere, "  which  is  doubtful.  His  Virgins  are  far  infe- 
rior to  those  of  Raphael;  but  despite  the  meagerness  of  his 
design  and  the  inaccuracy  of  certain  leady  tones  he  has  the 


15 2  REVOLUTION  Iff  INTERESTS.        [BOOK  III, 

glory  of  having  preceded  Raphael  in  beauty,  Michael  An- 
gelo  in  strength,  and  le  Corregio  in  grace. 

Painting  occupied  only  the  smallest  part  of  the  time  of 
Leonardo;  he  has  left  admirable  horses  in  relief,  a  beautiful 
model  of  Jesus  Christ  in  his  youth,  and  undertook  the  colos- 
sal equestrian  statue  of  Sforza  which  was  never  completed; 
as  engineer  he  joined  the  canal  of  Marsetana  to  that  of  the 
Ticino  by  remarkable  works,  and  fortified  the  strongholds  of 
the  Milanais;  finally,  he  practiced  mechanics  with  success. 
One  day  at  Milan  Louis  XII.  was  astonished  at  seeing  an 
automatic  lion  which  approached  him,  rose  upon  his  paws, 
and  opened  his  breast  to  show  the  shield  of  France.  It  was 
the  work  of  da  Vinci. 

Antonio  Allegri,  called  Correggio  because  he  was  born  at 
Correggio  near  Modena  in  1494,  owed  to  Raphael  the  revela- 
tion of  his  genius.  "And  I  also  am  a  painter!"  cried  he  before 
a  painting  of  the  divine  Sanzio.  He  passed  the  greater  part 
of  his  life  of  forty  years  at  Parma,  where  he  decorated  the 
dome  of  the  cathedral  with  magnificent  frescoes.  His  paint- 
ings, the  "Sleep  of  Antiope,"  in  the  Museum  of  the  Louvre, 
and  "St.  Jerome  of  Prague,"  are  perhaps  superior  by  the 
gorgeousness  of  light  and  perfection  of  effect,  but  his  suave 
and  graceful  style  led  to  affectation  those  who  walked  in  his 
steps  but  were  destitute  of  his  genius.  The  Museum  of  the 
Louvre  possesses  also  from  him  a  "Marriage  of  St.  Cath- 
erine." 

Giorgione  Barbarelli  (1448-1511)  and  Tiziano  Vecillo, 
called  the  Titian  (1477-1576),  both  pupils  of  Giovanni  Bellini 
(1426-1516),  belong  to  the  Venetian  school.  By  turns 
austere,  charming,  heroic,  and  simple,  they  were  always  and 
in  everything  the  princes  of  color,  the  former  with  perhaps 
more  originality  and  more  of  the  unexpected  than  the  latter. 
Many  of  the  frescoes  of  Giorgione  have  perished.  The 
Louvre  has  of  him  a  "Holy  Family"  and  a  "Rustic  Con- 
cert." Titian,  who  continued  his  career  till  the  age  of 
ninety-nine  with  almost  unabated  vigor,  was  the  painter  of 
Charles  V.  His  portraits  occupy  the  first  rank  among  his 
works,  and  perhaps  have  never  been  surpassed.  The 
French  possess  eighteen  of  his  paintings:  among  them 
"Christ  Placed  in  the  Tomb,"  the  "Pilgrims  of  Emmaus," 
the  "Coronation  with  Thorns,"  the  "Venus  del  Pardo,"  a 
portrait  of  Francis  I.  and  that  of  a  woman,  a  painting  of 
marvelous  beauty. 


CHAP.  XII.]  THE  RENAISSANCE.  153 

Raffaelle  Sanzio  (Raphael)  was  born  at  Urbino  in  1483  of 
a  family  of  painters.  He  handled  the  brush  from  his  child- 
hood and  had  Perugino  as  his  master,  whom  at  first  he  imi- 
tated with  docility,  whom  he  soon  equaled  and  finally  sur- 
passed. His  artistic  growth  was  not  characterized  by  the 
fire  and  suddenness  of  Michael  Angelo.  Three  epochs  and 
three  different  styles  are  visibly  remarked  in  his  works.  He 
came  to  Florence  in  1503,  lived  alternately  in  that  city  and 
Perugia,  and  established  himself  at  Rome  in  1508  when 
invited  by  Bramante,  his  kinsman.  His  Virgin,  the  "Beau- 
tiful Gardener,"  with  other  works  had  already  made  him 
illustrious.  Julius  II.  charged  him  with  decorating  the 
halls  of  the  Vatican;  he  there  executed  those  magnificent 
paintings  of  which  we  have  many  copies:  the  "Dispute  of 
the  Holy  Sacrament,  or  Theology,"  the  "School  of  Athens, 
or  Philosophy,"  "Parnassus,  or  Poetry,"  "Jurisprudence 
and  Justice,  or  Gregory  IX.  giving  the  Decretals  and  Jus- 
tinian the  Pandects."  A  calmer  and  sweeter  grandeur  than 
that  of  Michael  Angelo  indicated  a  new  period  of  painting. 
Everything  one  can  imagine  of  linear  beauty  and  harmoni- 
ous composition,  of  virgin  innocence  and  chaste  maternity, 
breathes  in  his  Virgins  and  his  Holy  Families,  which  the 
eye  cannot  weary  of  contemplating.  The  Louvre  possesses 
of  him  a  "Holy  Family"  and  a  "St.  Michael  hurling  down 
Lucifer."  Rome  admires,  moreover,  in  the  loggie  of  the 
Vatican  what  is  called  his  Bible,  fifty-two  subjects  from  the 
Old  Testament  executed  by  his  pupils  after  his  designs ;  in 
the  stanze  the  four  magnificent  compositions  mentioned 
above  and  the  "Deliverance  of  St.  Peter";  in  the  Pinaco- 
theke  the  "Transfiguration,"  which  is  perhaps  his  master- 
piece, and  the  "Madonna  di  Foligno";  in  the  Hall  of 
Constantine  the  "Celestial  Vision  of  the  Emperor,"  his 
"Victory  over  Maxentius,"  his  "Baptism,"  and  the  "Dona- 
tion of  Rome  to  the  Pope";  in  the  frescoes  of  the  Palace 
Farnesina  (Villa  Chigi)  the  graceful  poem  of  Psyche  in 
twelve  paintings;  at  San  Agostino  the  "Prophet  Isaiah," 
and  at  Santa  Maria  della  Pace  the  "Sibyls." 

Raphael  was  also  a  great  architect;  in  1514  succeeding 
Bramante,  he  constructed  the  court  of  the  Vatican,  whose 
loggie  he  decorated.  Intrusted  for  a  short  time  with  direct- 
ing the  construction  of  St.  Peter's,  he  proposed  a  nobler 
plan,  we  are  told,  than  that  which  was  followed.  However, 
it  is  idle  to  discuss  the  superiority  of  Michael  Angelo  or 


154  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.          [BOOK  III. 

Raphael,  yet  the  latter  has  neither  in  his  works  nor  in  his  char- 
acter the  grandeur,  slightly  fierce,  but  still  so  haughty,  of  the 
former.  Raphael  lived  always  in  favor,  rich,  acting  like  a 
prince,  aspiring  even  to  a  cardinal's  hat,  in  fine,  loaded 
with  the  gifts  of  Francis  I.,  who  bought  from  him  at  a  high 
price  his  great  "St.  Michael."  He  possessed  even  the  cour- 
tier's art  of  flattering  in  his  historic  paintings  the  powerful 
men  of  his  time;  by  an  anachronism  he  gave  the  features  of 
Francis  I.  to  Charlemagne  as  he  gave  those  of  Julius  II.  to 
the  high  priest  Onias  in  the  painting  "  Heliodorus  driven 
from  the  Temple,"  a  double  allusion,  for  this  Heliodorus 
was  the  image  of  the  barbarians  whom  the  fiery  pontiff  had 
desired  to  drive  from  Italy.  He  died  young  in  1520;  he 
was  barely  thirty-seven  years  old. 

"Leonardo  by  execution  and  character,  Michael  Angelo 
by  originality  and  knowledge  of  form,  Correggio  by  magic  of 
effect,  Giorgione  and  Titian  by  power  of  color,  had  attained 
a  degree  of  perfection  which  never  was  and  never  could  be 
greatly  surpassed;  Raphael  combined  all  these  qualities, 
not  in  the  same  measure  of  perfection,  but  to  a  degree  which 
has  made  of  him  the  first  of  artists,  the  unique  painter.  He 
possessed  the  ineffable  charm  of  grace  as  the  Greeks  under- 
stood it,  and  he  impressed  it  upon  all  his  works  so  that  it 
was,  so  to  speak,  his  autograph." 

But  why  have  these  great  men  left  no  successors?  Why 
has  this  splendid  efflorescence  of  Italian  art  so  quickly  faded? 
Is  it,  as  a  vain  rhetoric  declares,  because  everything  here 
below  is  only  fortune  and  misfortune,  darkness  after  light, 
death  after  life?  There  are  schools  like  that  of  France 
which,  once  constituted,  have  experienced  intermissions  but 
have  always  lived,  while  that  of  Italy  remained  three  centu- 
ries in  the  tomb.  It  is  because  Italian  art  lacked  the  moral 
force  which  makes  life;  it  loved  the  beautiful  and  that  alone. 
That  is  by  no  means  enough.  Native  country,  liberty, 
sentiments  and  ideas  which  lift  the  head  and  the  heart  high 
— these  were  known  no  longer.  The  noble  Michael  Angelo 
excepted,  all  said  like  Cellini,  "I  serve  him  who  pays  me." 
This  evil  became  general:  the  writers  held  out  their  hands 
like  the  artists.  Paolo  Giovio  had  two  pens — one  of  gold  for 
well-paid  flatteries,  one  of  silver  for  those  less  rewarded. 

In  the  arts  Italy  at  the  sixteenth  century  was  the  great 
teacher  of  the  nations.  France  was  entering  of  herself  into 
the  new  path,  and  under  Louis  XII.  was  already  erecting 


CHAP.  XII.]  THE  RENAISSANCE.  155 

graceful  monuments:  at  Rouen,  the  court  house;  at  Gaillon, 
the  castle;  at  Paris,  the  Hotel  de  la  Tremoille;  still  it  is  true 
that  the  Italy  of  Raphael  and  Michael  Angelo  had  much  to 
teach.  Francis  I.  borrowed  from  her  both  masters  and 
models.  He  purchased  more  than  a  hundred  statues,  and 
acquired  from  Leonardo  da  Vinci  the  "Joconde,"  from 
Raphael  "St.  Michael"  and  the  "Holy  Family."  By  his 
esteem  as  well  as  by  his  favors  he  attracted  the  most  distin- 
guished artists  of  Italy — the  aged  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  Rosso, 
Primaticio,  Andrea  del  Sarto,  Benvenuto  Cellini — to  build 
for  him  castles  or  to  decorate  his  palaces  of  Fontainebleau, 
St.  Germain,  Madrid,  Chambord,  and  Chenonceaux.  Fol- 
lowing the  example  of  the  king  the  nobles  replaced  their 
somber  feudal  dwellings  by  elegant  constructions.  Thus 
Montmorency  built  Ecouen  and  Chantilly,  Duprat  his  osten- 
tatious residence  of  Nantouillet,  Samblangay  the  castle  of 
the  same  name  near  Tours. 

Many  of  these  edifices,  notably  Chambord,  were  con- 
structed by  French  artists.  The  genius  of  the  French  archi- 
tects and  sculptors  increased  at  the  contact  of  Italian  art, 
and  this  century  counts  no  less  than  five  men  of  the  highest 
rank  as  sculptors,  architects,  or  painters.  Pierre  Lescot  of 
Paris  in  1541  designed  the  plan  of  the  Louvre  and  con- 
structed a  part  of  the  fagade  where  the  pavilion  of  the  Hor- 
loge  is  situated.  Philibert  Delorme,  born  at  Lyons,  com- 
menced the  palace  of  the  Tuileries  at  the  order  of  Queen 
Catherine  de  Medici  and  designed  the  tomb  of  Francis  I.  at 
St.  Denis.  The  bas-reliefs  are  the  work  of  a  Frenchman 
whose  name  remains  unknown,  but  who  had  as  a  pupil  Jean 
Goujon,  the  French  Phidias,  the  Correggio  of  sculpture. 
Jean  Goujon  knew  how  to  unite  knowledge  of  anatomy  with 
the  firmness  and  finish  of  the  chisel,  force  with  grace.  The 
most  remarkable  pieces  which  remain  to  us  from  him  are 
the  caryatides  of  the  Hall  of  the  Guards  at  the  Louvre,  the 
dainty  figures  of  the  Fountain  of  the  Innocents,  and  a  group 
of  the  huntress  Diana. 

Germain  Pilon  of  Mans  was  distinguished  by  extraordinary 
freedom  from  stiffness.  We  owe  him  the  sculptures  of  the 
mausoleum  of  Henry  II.,  the  tombs  of  Chancellor  Birague 
and  Guillaume  du  Bellay,  and  especially  the  group  of  the 
Three  Graces  sculptured  in  a  single  block  of  marble. 

Jean  Cousin,  born  at  Soucy  near  Sens  in  1501,  was  both 
sculptor  and  painter.  His  statue  of  Admiral  Chabot  places 


I56  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.        [BOOK  III. 

him  beside  Germain  Pilon;  but  he  was  at  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury unrivaled  in  France  for  stained  windows  and  paintings 
in  oil.  Yet  the  French  school  of  painting  commenced  only 
in  the  following  century  with  Lesueur  and  Poussin. 

Germany, on  the  contrary,  possessed  painters  and  no  sculp- 
tors. Albrecht  Durer  and  Holbein  are  to-day  still  famous, 
but  they  had  no  successor.  The  Reformation  was  as  fatal 
to  the  art  of  Germany  as  to  its  literature. 

Spain  and  England,  still  more  poorly  endowed,  had  in 
the  sixteenth  century  neither  artists  nor  monuments.  The 
Dutch  school  did  not  exist;  it  dates  from  the  following  cen- 
tury. That  of  Flanders,  founded  long  before  and  rendered 
illustrious  by  Van  Eyck  and  Hemmelinck,  was  slumberously 
waiting  for  the  coming  of  Rubens. 

Toward  the  middle  of  the  fifteenth  century  the  Florentine 
Finiguerra,  well  known  already  for  his  skill  at  inlaying  with 
enamel  work,  succeeded  in  making  beautiful  copies  of  the 
drawings  which  he  had  engraved  on  copper.  So  that  at  the 
very  moment  when  Gutenberg  found  the  means  of  infinitely 
multiplying  the  works  of  learned  men  and  of  great  writers, 
Finiguerra  bestowed  that  of  popularizing  through  all  the 
civilized  world  the  image  at  least  of  the  masterpieces  of  im- 
mortal artists.  Etching  was  invented  shortly  after,  and  two 
great  artists,  the  German  Albrecht  Diirer  (1471-1528)  and 
the  Bolognese  Marc  Antonio  Raimondi  (1488-1546),  carried 
this  art  at  once  to  a  high  degree  of  perfection.  Their  engrav- 
ings are  still  sought  after.  Albrecht  Diirer,  who  was  also  a 
great  painter,  drew  his  own  designs.  Marc  Antonio  repro- 
duced the  masterpieces  of  Raphael. 

The  Middle  Ages  had  only  very  imperfect  instruments, 
the  rebeck  (three-stringed  violin),  the  monochord,  the  clavi- 
chord, and  the  spinet,  which  offered  scant  resources  for  com- 
position. But  in  the  sixteenth  century  the  rebeck  of  min- 
strelsy by  the  addition  of  a  fourth  string  and  by  a  few 
changes  in  form  became  the  violin,  that  is  to  say,  the  most 
important  instrument  of  the  orchestra.  Apparently  this  in- 
novation took  place  in  France.  The  harpsichord,  which  is 
for  the  composer  an  entire  orchestra,  toward  the  year  1500 
assumed  a  great  importance  when  a  simple  joiner  of  Ant- 
werp, Hans  Buckers,  carried  the  compass  of  the  keyboard  to 
four  octaves,  and  doubled  the  chords  of  each  note  to  obtain 
more  varied  effects  and  greater  sonorousness.  When  instru- 
ments were  no  longer  lacking  composers  appeared  and 


CHAP.  XII.]  THE  RENAISSANCE.  157 

schools  were  founded.  In  1527  another  Fleming,  Adrian 
Willaert,  choir  master  at  St.  Mark's  of  Venice,  founded  the 
first  real  school  of  music.  Instead  of  simple  motets  thence- 
forward were  composed  masses  and  psalms  with  choruses, 
each  in  four  parts.  Dramatic  music  was  not  born  till  the 
end  of  the  century,  the  first  regular  opera  or  lyric  drama,  the 
"Death  of  Eurydice, "  a  tragedy  with  couplets  and  choruses, 
having  been  represented  at  Florence  on  the  occasion  of  the 
marriage  of  Henry  IV.  with  Maria  de  Medici  (1599);  but 
religious  music  was  already  attaining  its  greatest  height  with 
Palestrina  (1524-94),  who  devoted  himself  to  giving  his 
melodies  a  character  in  keeping  with  the  sense  of  the  words 
which  they  accompanied.  The  Church  still  repeats  his  in- 
spired accents,  his  Stabat  and  his  Miserere.  From  that 
time  musical  taste  extended.  Henry  VIII.,  Elizabeth, 
Charles  IX.,  aspired  to  the  title  of  good  musicians. 

Science  was  still  hesitating  between  the  reveries  of  the 
Middle  Ages  and  the  stern  reason  which  guides  it  to-day. 
So  the  mathematician  Cardano  of  Pavia 
of^c?*ncesnce  (lS°l-7°)  believed  in  astrology,  and  especially 
wished  to  make  others  believe  in  it;  Paracelsus 
of  Einsiedeln  in  Schwytz  (1493-1541)  was  a  physician  and 
thaumaturgist;  Cornelius  Agrippa,  engineer,  general,  and 
theologian,  was  fifteen  or  twenty  times  condemned  to  death 
as  a  disciple  of  the  occult  sciences.  How  many  people 
clung  to  the  Middle  Ages!  How  many  people  even  among 
the  strongest  minds,  like  Ambroise  Pare  and  Jean  Bodin,  con- 
tinued to  believe  in  the  devil,  demons,  and  witches!  The 
latter  swarmed  since  the  Inquisition  sent  them  to  the  funeral 
pile,  and  there  was  during  a  century  and  a  hnlf  one  of  those 
moral  epidemics  which  in  our  day  happily  last  only  a  few 
months.  Thousands  of  madmen  who  should  have  been 
treated  with  hellebore,  as  Alciati  says,  perished  in  the 
flames.  In  a  few  years  there  were  6500  trials  for  witch- 
craft in  the  electorate  of  Treves,  and  30,000  in  England. 
One  counselor  of  the  Duke  of  Lorraine  boasts  of  having 
executed  900  witches  in  fifteen  years.  In  the  single 
city  of  Wurtzburg  158  were  burned  in  1627  and  1628. 
Few  wars  have  been  so  bloody  as  the  legal  butcheries  of 
these  wretches  by  the  Inquisition.  A  German  Jesuit, 
Father  Spe,  had  the  courage  to  lift  his  voice  against  these 
abominable  proceedings.  His  name  deserves  to  be  drawn 
from  oblivion  and  placed  beside  that  of  the  French  Male- 


158  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.        [BOOK  III. 

branche,  who  opposed  the  persecution  of  supposed 
witches. 

But  if  the  vain  imaginations  of  the  Middle  Ages  guarded 
an  empire  that  was  scarcely  shaken,  cold  and  stern  reason 
here  and  there  pierced  those  heavy  shades,  as  lofty  moun- 
tains lift  their  crests  in  the  full  light  above  the  clouds  which 
roll  cumbrously  along  their  slopes  and  through  the  moist 
and  darksome  valleys. 

To  Modern  Times  belong  by  their  intellect  and  the  char- 
acter of  their  labors  Tartaglia,  who  died  at  Venice  in  1557, 
who  resolved  the  equation  of  the  third  degree  by  new  for- 
mulas and  applied  mathematics  to  the  art  of  war;  Vesalius 
of  Brussels,  physician  of  Charles  V.  and  of  Philip  II.,  who 
founded  human  anatomy  and  long  taught  in  Italy;  Ferrari  of 
Bologna  (1522-66),  who  devised  an  ingenious  method  for  the 
solution  of  equations  of  the  fourth  degree;  and  a  little  later 
the  French  Viete  (1540-1603),  who  discovered  the  applica- 
tion of  algebra  to  geometry,  and  preceded  Descartes  and 
Newton  in  the  path  of  mathematical  analysis. 

Arts,  letters  even,  can  be  developed  only  in  certain  cir- 
cumstances. Science  is  more  independent  of  external  con- 
ditions; there  is  no  reason  for  surprise  if  the  most  learned 
man  of  the  century  was  a  Pole,  Copernicus,  born  in  1473, 
a  native  of  Thorn  and  a  student  of  Cracow.  His  studies 
embraced  all  branches  of  knowledge;  he  devoted  himself  to 
philosophy,  received  the  degree  of  doctor  in  medicine,  and 
studied  drawing  and  painting  so  as  to  derive  greater  profit 
from  a  journey  which  he  made  in  Italy.  Returning  to  his 
country  in  possession  of  a  canonicate,  he  gave  himself  up  to 
his  great  work  upon  the  system  of  the  world.  He  passed  in 
review  all  the  ideas  of  his  contemporaries  and  of  the  ancients; 
he  saw  the  Egyptians  make  Mercury  and  Venus  revolve 
around  the  sun,  but  the  sun  itself,  as  likewise  Mars,  Jupiter, 
and  Saturn,  around  the  earth ;  he  saw  Apollonius  of  Perga 
consider  the  sun  as  center  of  all  planetary  movements,  but 
make  it  also  turnaround  the  earth.  In  all  these  systems  the 
earth  was  the  center  of  the  universe.  To  depose  it  from  this 
supreme  rank,  what  audacity !  What  an  assault  upon  vulgar 
prejudices,  upon  the  pride  which  makes  man  believe  himself 
the  universal  center !  All  this  Copernicus  dared  ;  to  the  earth, 
besides  the  rotary  movement  on  its  axis  already  imagined  by 
a  few  ancient  philosophers,  he  attributed  a  movement  of 
gravitation,  formerly  seen  obscurely  by  Philolaos,  around 


CHAP.  XII.]  THE  RENAISSANCE.  159 

the  sun,  henceforth  immovable  in  the  center  of  the  universe. 
As  early  as  1507  Copernicus  was  in  possession  of  his  new 
system;  this  he  spent  the  remaining  thirty-six  years  of  his 
life  in  verifying  by  observation  and  calculation.  So  high 
was  the  genius  of  this  illustrious  man  that  many  consequences 
which  he  had  derived  from  his  principles  without  himself 
being  able  to  verify  them  were  later  recognized  as  true. 
Meanwhile  he  was  a  butt  for  the  sarcasms  and  railleries  of 
the  crowd.  He  was  ridiculed  upon  the  theater  as  Socrates 
had  been.  "What  do  you  care?"  said  he  to  his  friends.  "I 
do  not  know  what  pleases  the  common  herd,  and  the  common 
herd  does  not  understand  what  I  know."  Moreover, his  great 
work  "De  Revolutionibus  Orbium  Celestium,"  dedicated 
to  Pope  Paul  III.,  did  not  appear  till  the  year  of  his  death; 
his  glory  began  at  the  moment  when  his  life  ended  (1543). 

Thus  while  the  navigators  were  discovering  and  delivering 
new  worlds  to  human  activity  science  was  discovering  and 
delivering  the  true  laws  of  the  universe  to  human  contempla- 
tion. What  cause  for  astonishment,  then,  if  the  century 
which  saw  these  great  results  of  audacity  and  intelligence  sur- 
rendered itself  to  the  mighty  dominion  of  thought? 


CHAPTER   XIII. 
REVOLUTION   IN   CREEDS,   OR   THE   REFORMATION. 


State  of  the  Clergy  in  the  Sixteenth  Century. — Luther  :  The  Reformation 
in  Germany  and  in  the  Scandinavian  States  (1517-55). — Zwingli  and 
Calvin :  The  Reformation  in  Switzerland,  France,  the  Netherlands, 
and  Scotland  (1517-59). — The  Reformation  in  England  (1531-62). 
— Principal  Differences  among  the  Protestant  Churches. 


ONE  of  the  most  distinguished  statesmen  of  the  sixteenth 
century,  Cardinal  Pole,  wrote  to  Pope  Leo  X.  that  it  was 
dangerous  to  render  men  too  learned.  In 
clergy6  fn  the  fact  the  Renaissance  of  letters  partly  caused 
sixteenth  cen-  the  religious  Reformation.  Study  of  the 
ancients  opened  new  horizons  to  thought. 
The  invention  of  printing,  the  discovery  of  America,  the 
progress  of  manufactures,  the  immense  extension  of  com- 
merce, awoke  new  ideas  in  the  mind.  Man  felt  his  intelli- 
gence increase  at  the  same  time  that  he  saw  his  dominions 
widen. 

Astonished  by  all  these  novelties,  he  began  to  doubt  many 
ancient  things.  The  spirit  of  curiosity  and  examination 
applied  itself  to  all;  it  had  transformed  arts,  letters,  and  the 
social  state;  it  wished  also  to  transform  religious  institu- 
tions. 

There  then  took  place  something  analogous  to  that  which 
our  fathers  saw.  The  literature  of  the  eighteenth  century 
by  its  habit  of  ascending  in  everything  to  principles  pre- 
pared the  political  and  social  revolutions  of  1789;  that  of  the 
sixteenth  through  its  veneration  for  the  two  antiquities,  the 
sacred  and  classic,  which  had  just  been,  as  it  were,  refound, 
led  to  the  religious  Reformation,  whose  true  character  is  a 
mixture  of  the  rational  spirit  derived  from  the  pagans  and  of 
theological  ardor  borrowed  from  the  Bible,  St.  Paul,  and  St. 
Augustine. 

160 


REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  161 

But  the  first  author  of  this  revolution  was  the  clergy  itself. 
The  religious  spirit  was  dying.  What  was  there  in  common 
between  the  Church  of  the  early  days,  poor,  humble,  ardent, 
and  the  Church  opulent,  sovereign,  idle,  of  this  Leo  X.  who 
lived  like  a  gentleman  of  the  Renaissance  with  huntsmen, 
artists,  and  poets  much  more  than  with  theologians;  or  the 
Church  of  Cardinal  Bembo,  who  wrote  to  Sadoleto:  "Do  not 
read  the  epistles  of  St.  Paul  for  fear  that  such  a  barbarous 
style  will  corrupt  your  tastes.  Leave  those  trifles,  unworthy 
of  a  serious  man."  ("Omitte  has  nugas;  non  enim  decent 
gravem  virum  tales  ineptiae.")  And  the  monks,  what  was 
not  said  of  them?  The  ways  of  the  world  are  not  changed 
by  satires;  Erasmus,  Hutten,  and  all  the  diatribes  could 
have  accomplished  nothing  in  the  thirteenth  century.  They 
had  great  influence  in  the  sixteenth,  because  abuses  which 
did  not  earlier  exist  or  which  were  still  very  feeble  had 
three  centuries  later  reached  a  dangerous  development  in 
the  discipline  and  manners  of  the  clergy.  Let  us  listen  to 
the  last  of  the  Church  fathers.  "Centuries  ago,"  said 
Bossuet,  "the  reformation  of  Church  discipline  was  desired; 
'Who  will  grant  me  before  I  die,'  said  St.  Bernard,  'to  see  the 
Church  of  God  as  it  was  in  the  early  days?'  '  If  this  holy 
man  experienced  any  regret  in  dying,  it  was  that  he  had  not 
beheld  so  happy  a  change.  He  groaned  all  his  life  at  the 
evils  of  the  Church.  He  did  not  cease  to  warn  the  peoples, 
the  clergy,  the  bishops,  the  Popes  even,  concerning  them; 
he  did  not  fear  to  warn  concerning  them  the  recluses  who 
in  their  solitude  were  afflicted  with  him,  and  who  the  more 
praised  divine  goodness  for  having  brought  them  there, 
inasmuch  as  corruption  was  increasing  in  the  world. 

The  mother  of  churches,  the  Roman  Church,  which  during 
nine  entire  centuries  was  foremost  in  observing  ecclesiastical 
discipline  with  exemplary  exactness,  and  which  with  all  its 
strength  maintained  it  through  the  world,  was  not  exempt 
from  the  evil.  From  the  time  of  the  Council  of  Vienne,  the 
great  bishop  charged  by  the  Pope  with  preparation  of  the 
subjects  which  were  to  be  treated  there,  put  as  the  funda- 
mental task  of  that  holy  assembly  the  necessity  of  reforming 
the  Church  in  its  chief  and  in  its  members.  The  great  schism 
which  came  a  little  after  put  this  word  reform  more  than 
ever  upon  the  lips,  not  only  of  private  doctors,  of  Gerson, 
of  Pierre  d'Aille,  of  the  other  leading  men  of  the  time,  but 
also  of  the  councils;  each  was  full  of  it  in  the  councils  of 


162  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.        [BOOK  III. 

Pisa  and  Basel,  where  the  Reformation  was  unhappily  eluded 
and  the  Church  plunged  into  new  divisions.  To  Eugenius 
IV.,  Cardinal  Julian  represented  the  disorders  of  the  clergy, 
especially  that  of  Germany.  "These  disorders,"  said  he  to 
him,"  excite  the  hatred  of  the  people  against  all  ecclesiasti- 
cal order;  if  it  is  not  corrected  it  is  to  be  feared  that  the  laity, 
following  the  example  of  the  Hussites,  will  attack  the  clergy 
as  they  now  openly  menace  us  with  doing."  If  the  clergy  of 
Germany  was  not  promptly  reformed  he  predicted  that  after 
the  heresy  of  Bohemia  was  extinguished  there  would  speedily 
arise  another  still  more  dangerous.  "For  they  will  say," 
continued  he,  "that  the  clergy  is  incorrigible,  and  is  willing 
to  apply  no  remedy  to  its  disorders.  They  will  attack  us," 
continued  this  great  cardinal,  "when  they  have  no  longer 
any  hope  of  our  correction.  Men's  minds  are  waiting  for 
what  shall  be  done;  it  seems  as  if  shortly  something  tragic 
will  be  brought  forth.  The  venom  which  they  have  against 
us  is  becoming  evident;  soon  they  will  believe  they  are  mak- 
ing a  sacrifice  agreeable  to  God  by  maltreating  or  despoiling 
the  ecclesiastics  as  people  odious  to  God  and  man,  and  im- 
mersed to  the  utmost  in  evil.  The  little  reverence  still 
remaining  for  the  sacred  order  will  be  destroyed.  Responsi- 
bility for  all  these  disorders  will  be  charged  upon  the  court 
of  Rome,  which  will  be  regarded  as  the  cause  of  all  these 
evils  because  it  has  neglected  to  apply  the  necessary  remedy. ' ' 

He  resumed  in  a  higher  tone.  "I  see,"  said  he,  "that 
the  ax  is  at  the  root,  the  tree  inclines,  and  instead  of  sus- 
taining it  while  it  might  still  be  done  we  precipitate  it  to  the 
earth."  He  saw  a  speedy  desolation  impending  over  the 
German  clergy.  The  temporal  possessions,  of  which  they 
wished  to  deprive  it,  seemed  to  him  the  point  whereat  the 
evil  would  commence.  "The  bodies,"  said  he,  "will  perish 
with  the  souls.  God  takes  from  us  the  sight  of  our  perils, 
just  as  he  is  wont  to  do  with  those  whom  he  wishes  to 
punish:  the  fire  is  lighted  before  us  and  we  rush  forward." 

Thus  in  the  fifteenth  century  this  cardinal,  the  greatest 
man  of  his  time,  deplored  the  evils;  he  foresaw  their  fatal 
consequences:  therefore  he  seems  to  have  anticipated  those 
which  Luther  was  about  to  bring  upon  all  Christianity, 
commencing  with  Germany;  and  he  was  not  mistaken  in 
believing  that  unwillingness  to  reform  and  increasing  hatred 
against  the  clergy  would  beget  a  sect  more  formidable  to 
the  Church  than  that  of  the  Hussites. 


CHAP.  XIII.]         REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  163 

Thus  Bossuet  himself  attests  that  in  many  parts  of  Chris- 
tendom, especially  where  the  clergy  possessed  as  in  Germany 
almost  a  third,  and  as  in  England  almost  a  fifth, 

Luther :    The          .  .     .  °    .  ,  . 

Reformation  in  of  the  lands,  and  in  the  midst  of  so  much 
irierthenscandi^  wealth  forgot  its  discipline,  men's  minds  were 
navian  states  prepared  for  revolution  when  Luther  appeared. 
Born  at  Eisleben  in  1483,  this  son  of  a  poor 
Saxon  miner  became  the  doctor  the  most  listened  to  of  the 
University  of  Wittenberg.  "He  possessed  strength  with  his 
genius,  vehemence  in  his  discourses,  a  living  and  impetuous 
eloquence  which  swept  away  and  took  entire  possession  of  the 
peoples,  an  extraordinary  boldness  when  he  saw  himself  sus- 
tained and  applauded,  with  an  air  of  authority  which  made 
his  disciples  tremble  before  him,  so  that  they  did  not  dare 
to  contradict  him  in  things  either  great  or  small." 

The  wars  of  Julius  II.  had  exhausted  the  pontifical  treas- 
ury. Then  came  the  extravagances  of  Leo  X. ,  who  expended 
100,000  ducats  at  his  coronation  and  gave  500  for  a  sonnet. 
Thus  in  order  to  live  he  was  obliged  to  pawn  the  jewels  of 
St.  Peter  and  to  sell  offices,  which  increased  by  40,000  ducats 
the  annual  revenue  of  the  government.  St.  Peter's  in  Rome, 
the  splendid  temple  commenced  by  Julius  II.  upon  a  plan 
which  was  to  make  it  the  most  grandiose  sanctuary  of  Chris- 
tianity, was  in  danger  of  remaining  unfinished.  Leo  X. 
accorded  indulgences  to  all  those  who  would  contribute  to 
its  completion.  The  Archbishop  of  Maintz,  charged  with 
announcing  these  indulgences  in  Germany,  had  them  sol- 
emnly proclaimed  in  Saxony  by  the  Dominican  Tetzel. 
There  were  great  abuses  committed,  both  in  the  exagger- 
ated promises  made  to  the  faithful  who  purchased  these 
means  of  salvation  and  in  the  employment  under  their  very 
eyes  of  a  part  of  their  money.  The  Augustines,  till  then 
charged  with  the  sale  of  indulgences,  were  irritated  when 
they  saw  this  lucrative  mission  pass  into  the  hands  of  the 
Dominicans.  Displeasure  revealed  to  them  abuses,  and 
these  abuses  were  rudely  attacked  by  their  most  eminent 
doctor,  Martin  Luther,  whom  his  theological  studies  had 
caused  to  hold  entirely  different  ideas.  He  was  in  fact 
already  planted  upon  the  principle  which  has  remained  the 
foundation  of  the  Protestant  churches,  justification  by  faith 
alone,  while  the  doctrine  of  indulgences  supposes  also  justi- 
fication by  works.  Such  was  the  commencement  of  the 
Reformation. 


1 64  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

Luther  at  first  cast  the  blame  only  on  Tetzel.  "He 
attacked  primarily  the  abuses  which  many  made  of  indul- 
gences and  the  excesses  which  they  preached.  But  he  was 
too  ardent  to  confine  himself  within  these  limits;  from 
abuses  he  passed  quickly  to  the  thing  itself.  He  advanced 
by  degrees,  and  still,  while  he  was  always  depreciating  the 
indulgences  and  reducing  them  almost  to  nothing  by  his 
manner  of  explanation,  at  bottom  he  appeared  to  be  in 
accord  with  his  adversaries,  because  when  he  put  his  propo- 
sitions in  writing  there  was  one  couched  in  these  terms:  "If 
any  one  denies  the  verity  of  the  papal  indulgences  let  him 
be  anathema'  "  (Bossuet). 

On  All  Saints'  Day  (1517)  Luther  affixed  to  the  door  of 
the  great  church  of  Wittenberg  95  propositions  con- 
cerning indulgences.  Tetzel  replied  with  no  counter  prop- 
ositions. The  battle  was  engaged.  Forced  to  defend  him- 
self, Luther  directed  his  attention  to  formidable  questions, 
and, carried  away  by  the  heat  of  the  combat,  soon  left  aside 
Tetzel  and  the  indulgences  to  arraign  the  Pope  himself  and 
the  Catholic  dogmas.  "Little  by  little  he  became  excited 
against  the  Church  and  plunged  into  schism"  (Bossuet). 

At  the  first  news  of  these  disputes,  "It  is  a  monkish 
quarrel,"  Leo  X.  replied  to  those  who  foresaw  an  innovator 
in  the  bold  theologian  ;  he  had  forgotten  Luther  and  Tetzel 
that  he  might  return  to  hear  the  "Calandra"of  Bibbiena  or 
the  "Mandragola"  of  Machiavelli.  However,  since  the  noise 
increased,  in  1518  he  sent  Cardinal  Cajetano  to  Augsburg, 
who  sought  by  caresses  and  menaces  to  shake  the  Saxon 
monk,  but  Luther  had  become  confirmed  in  his  doctrines;  he 
refused  the  cardinal  as  a  judge,  and  appealed  from  the  Pope 
badly  informed  to  the  Pope  better  informed.  This  was  still 
recognizing  the  pontifical  authority.  The  following  year  his 
protector,  the  Elector  of  Saxony,  having  become  vicar  of  the 
empire  by  the  death  of  the  emperor  Maximilian,  he  made  an 
additional  step:  he  appealed  from  the  Pope  to  a  general 
council.  In  forming  this  appeal  Luther  did  not  yet  pass 
beyond  the  ideas  of  the  fathers  of  Basel  and  Constance,  who 
had  proclaimed  the  authority  of  general  councils  superior 
to  that  of  the  sovereign  pontiff;  but  after  having  rejected 
the  Pope,  he  was  led  to  reject  the  councils;  after  the  coun- 
cils, the  fathers — that  is  to  say,  all  human  authority — to  place 
himself  face  to  face  with  Scripture,  to  hereafter  listen,  as  he 
said,  only  to  the  word  of  God,  wishing  between  it  and  him 


CHAP.  XIII.]         REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  165 

no  intermediary.  But  Scripture  is  not  always  so  clear,  so 
accessible  to  all  intelligences,  that  an  interpreter  is  unnec- 
essary if  one  wishes  to  maintain  unity  of  belief;  this  inter- 
preter the  Catholic  Church  recognized  in  the  Pope.  Luther 
suppressing  him,  each  one  could  interpret  the  Scriptures 
according  to  his  fancy;  the  unity  of  the  Church  was  de- 
stroyed; "The  garment  without  seam  was  torn;"  the  sects 
multiplied,  and  some  perverted  spirits,  reading  in  Scripture 
what  their  evil  passions  wished  to  find  there,  gave  birth  to 
monstrous  doctrines  which  appalled  all  parties.  As  early  as 
the  year  1519  Luther  had  progressed  far  in  his  opinions. 
Already  he  attacked  the  authority  of  the  Popes,  the  sacra- 
ments and  monastic  vows,  and  he  touched  upon  the  formi- 
dable questions  of  grace  and  free  will.  In  1520  he  addressed 
to  the  Pope  his  book  upon  "Christian  Liberty,"  which  per- 
mitted Leo  X.  no  longer  to  temporize.  June  15,  1520,  a  bull 
was  launched  against  him  which  condemned  forty-one  prop- 
ositions extracted  from  his  book  and  menaced  him  with  ex- 
communication if  he  did  not  retract  in  sixty  days.  But  what 
could  this  worn-out  weapon  do  since  it  served  for  so  many 
things,  even  the  smallest,  as  to  strike  at  those  who  reprinted 
Tacitus  or  Ariosto  in  competition  with  the  pontifical  editor? 
Breaking  forever  with  Rome,  at  Wittenberg  Luther  burned 
the  bull  of  the  Pope  while  an  enthusiastic  crowd  applauded. 

What  gave  him  so  much  audacity  was  the  fact  that  the 
number  of  his  partisans  was  increasing  every  day.  The 
people  were  delighted  that  they  were  called  themselves  to 
read  the  Scriptures,  translated  into  German  by  Luther,  and 
that  the  riches  of  the  clergy  were  denounced  as  a  violation 
of  the  Gospel.  The  princes,  to  whom  the  resources  of  the 
Middle  Ages  no  longer  sufficed  for  the  increasing  expenses  of 
the  growing  luxury,  of  the  administration  which  was  devel- 
oping, of  the  armies  which  must  be  paid,  heard  with  pleas- 
ure protestations  against  these  great  domains  of  the  Church 
— protestations  exceedingly  convenient  to  them.  Many,  in 
fine,  were  flattered  that  those  great  and  troublesome  ques- 
tions were  brought  from  the  sanctuary  into  the  public 
square;  they  yielded  to  the  irresistible  attraction  of  reli- 
gious liberty  which  Luther  caused  to  glitter  before  their  eyes, 
sure  to  use  it  against  himself  as  he  had  used  it  against  the 
Pope. 

However,  when  the  interregnum  ceased,  Charles  V.,  who 
needed  the  Pope  against  Francis  I.,  and  who  was  determined 


1 66  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.        [BOOK  III. 

to  restore  religious  peace  in  the  empire,  convoked  a  grand 
diet  at  Worms  (1521).  Luther  went  thither  with  a  safe  con- 
duct, and  refused  solemnly  to  retract  any  of  his  opinions 
unless  the  error  was  proved  to  him  by  the  Holy  Scriptures. 
The  diet  placed  the  reformer  under  the  ban  of  the  empire; 
but  such  had  been  the  attitude  of  the  people  and  that  of  a 
great  number  of  princes  that  they  did  not  dare  to  violate  the 
imperial  safe  conduct.  Happier  than  had  been  John  Huss, 
Luther  was  able  to  depart  from  Worms,  and  his  protector 
kept  him  concealed  almost  a  year  in  the  castle  of  the  Wart- 
burg  in  Thuringia. 

From  this  retreat,  where  he  completed  his  translation  of 
the  Bible  into  the  common  language,  Luther  with  impunity 
spread  his  doctrines  through  all  Germany;  printing  gave  his 
pamphlets  unlimited  publicity.  They  penetrated  hovel  and 
palace  alike. 

Moreover,  the  reformer  was  cautious  in  conduct  toward 
the  princes,  so  powerful  since  the  fall  of  the  Hohenstaufens. 
The  secularization  of  the  property  of  the  Church  was  a  prize 
offered  to  their  covetousness;  in  1525  the  grand  master  of 
the  Teutonic  order  declared  himself  hereditary  Duke  of 
Prussia  under  the  suzerainty  of  Poland.  A  great  part  of  the 
ecclesiastical  domains  of  lower  Germany  were  invaded.  As 
early  as  the  year  1525  the  Elector  of  Saxony,  the  Landgrave 
of  Hesse  Cassel,  the  dukes  of  Mecklenburg,  Pomerania,  and 
Zell,  and  a  large  number  of  imperial  cities  had  embraced 
the  Reformation  and  at  the  same  time  secularized  the  posses- 
sions of  the  Church  situated  in  their  territory. 

The  grandees  would  have  gladly  taken  charge  of  the  direc- 
tion and  profits  of  the  Reformation;  but  when  the  people 
saw  them  lay  their  hands  upon  the  goods  of  the  clergy  they 
wished  in  their  fashion  to  have  part  in  the  spoil.  Besides, 
there  was  deep  resentment  against  the  feudal  oppression 
which  the  ecclesiastical  no  less  than  the  secular  lords  had 
exercised  over  them  for  centuries.  Extensive  riots  had 
already  broken  out  in  1471  and  1492.  In  1500  the  associ- 
ation of  the  Shoe  had  been  a  menace  against  the  nobles; 
insurrections  had  taken  place  in  1505  and  in  1513.  The 
principal  centers  of  this  demagogic  excitement  were  the 
Netherlands  and  Swabia.  When  the  sermons  of  Luther 
fell  upon  these  irritated  minds  they  inflamed  them  with 
savage  ardor.  Leaving  aside  theologic  questions,  they  went 
straight  to  social  questions;  translating  a  spirit  of  charity  in 


CHAP.  XIII.]          REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  167 

the  Gospel  into  a  spirit  of  egotism,  they  demanded  absolute 
equality,  community  of  goods,  and  overthrow  of  all  author- 
ity, religious  or  civil.  These  terrible  sectaries,  who  drew 
after  them  all  the  peasants  from  Swabia  to  Thuringia,  gave 
themselves  the  name  of  Anabaptists,  because  they  were 
regenerated,  they  claimed,  by  a  second  baptism. 

Their  chief  was  Thomas  Munzer.  Luther  was  not  satis- 
fied with  disavowing  them;  he  preached  against  them  a  war 
of  extermination.  Dispersed  at  Frankenhausen,  the  peas- 
ants perished  by  thousands  (1525). 

The  peasants'  war  frightened  everybody.  The  Catholic 
princes  considered  themselves  authorized  by  the  danger 
which  social  order  had  an  instant  undergone  to  form  a  con- 
federacy at  Dessau  (1525).  The  Reformed  princes  on  the 
other  hand  signed  the  union  of  Torgau  (1526).  Germany 
found  itself  separated  into  two  leagues,  independent  of  the 
imperial  power,  and  war  seemed  imminent.  But  Charles 
V.,  occupied  alternately  by  Francis  I.  and  Soulei'man,  tem- 
porized so  as  not  to  create  a  new  enemy  in  Germany.  It 
was  proposed  to  have  the  question  settled  by  an  assembly 
of  doctors  of  the  Church ;  but  both  sides  were  afraid  to  unite 
in  a  council  where  the  Reformers  knew  beforehand  they 
would  be  in  a  minority,  and  where  the  court  of  Rome  feared 
to  find  again  the  traditions  of  the  councils  of  Basel  and  Con- 
stance. 

In  1529  the  Ottomans  were  ravaging  Hungary.  To  ob- 
tain the  assistance  of  all  the  German  princes,  Charles  V.  at 
the  diet  of  Spires  had  liberty  of  conscience  proclaimed,  but 
at  the  same  time  forbade  the  propagation  of  the  new  doctrine 
concerning  the  Lord's  Supper  (1529).  The  Reformers  pro- 
tested against  this  exception.  The  name  of  Protestants  has 
since  been  given  them.  The  following  year  they  presented 
at  the  diet  of  Augsburg  an  official  confession  of  their 
beliefs,  which  since  then  has  been  the  symbol  and  bond  of 
union  among  all  the  partisans  of  Luther  (1530).  They  drew 
their  union  closer  at  Smalkalde  (1531),  and  the  emperor, 
menaced  by  Soulei'man,  granted  them  the  peace  or  interim 
of  Nuremberg  (1532).  Two  years  after  they  were  strong 
enough  to  reinstate  the  Duke  of  Wurtemburg,  Ulrich,  and 
to  impose  on  the  Catholics  the  treaty  of  Cadan  in  Bohemia, 
which  granted  the  Lutherans  free  exercise  of  their  faith. 

However,  the  Anabaptists  reappeared  at  Munster  in  West- 
phalia on  the  borders  of  Holland,  but  this  time  with  a  more 


i68  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

regular  and  hence  a  more  disquieting  organization.  John 
Matthiesen,  a  baker  of  Haarlem,  was  their  supreme  prophet. 
They  expelled  from  the  city  the  bishop,  all  the  wealthy,  and 
all  those  who  were  unwilling  to  be  rebaptized,  and  then  com- 
menced the  frightful  saturnalia  of  mad  demagogism. 

They  pillaged  the  churches  and  monasteries,  burned  every 
book  except  the  Bible,  and  had  goods  in  common.  From 
this  biblical  demagogism  issued  an  unbridled  despotism.  A 
farrier  having  spoken  ill  of  the  prophets,  Matthiesen  assem- 
bled the  commune  in  the  market  and  shot  the  unfortunate 
man.  Then  he  cried  out  that  the  Father  ordered  him  to 
repulse  the  enemy,  and  halberd  in  hand,  precipitated  him- 
self alone  out  of  the  city;  he  had  no  sooner  passed  the  gate 
than  he  was  slain. 

John  Bocold,  a  tailor's  apprentice  from  Leyden,  succeeded 
him  as  supreme  prophet,  and  some  time  later  as  king,  after 
one  of  the  prophets  had  announced  that  it  had  been  revealed 
to  him  that  John  of  Leyden  was  to  rule  over  all  the  earth 
and  to  occupy  the  throne  of  David  until  the  time  when  God 
the  Father  would  come  to  demand  the  government  for  him- 
self. 

The  new  king  established  the  plurality  of  wives  and  sur- 
rounded himself  with  a  sumptuous  court  while  the  people 
died  of  famine,  as  the  Bishop  of  Munster  held  the  city  closely 
besieged.  A  contemporary  story  relates  that  one  of  the 
queens  having  said  one  day  to  her  companions  that  she  did 
not  believe  it  conformed  with  the  will  of  God  that  the  poor 
people  should  be  afflicted  with  so  many  miseries,  the  king 
conducted  her  to  the  market  place  with  his  other  wives, 
ordered  her  to  kneel  in  the  midst  of  her  companions,  who 
were  prostrate  like  herself,  and  struck  off  her  head.  The 
other  queens  sang  "Glory  to  God  in  the  highest!"  and  all  the 
people  began  to  dance  around  the  dead  body  of  the  victim. 
However,  there  was  nothing  left  to  eat  except  bread  and  salt ! 
Toward  the  end  of  the  siege  the  famine  became  so  great  that 
the  flesh  of  the  dead  was  distributed  daily.  The  city  was 
finally  carried  by  storm  on  St.  John's  Day  (1535).  John  of 
Leyden,  taken  alive,  was  torn  in  pieces  by  red-hot  pincers. 
The  new  Zion,  sustained  by  this  intoxication  of  fanaticism 
and  debauch,  had  defended  itself  for  fifteen  months  against 
all  the  forces  of  Northern  Germany. 

The  Catholics  considered  the  Reformation  responsible  for 
the  scandals  of  Munster.  The  political  schism  of  Germany 


CHAP.  XIII.]         REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  169 

assumed  every  day  a  more  definite  character;  the  emperor 
waited,  temporized,  and  endeavored  to  avoid  a  conflict  for 
which  he  did  not  feel  himself  ready.  All  his  activity  was 
not  too  much  in  the  midst  of  such  a  complication  of  affairs; 
he  had  to  defend  Austria  against  the  incessant  attacks  of  the 
sultan,  and  the  kingdom  of  Naples  against  the  corsairs  of 
Barbary ;  he  was  engaged  in  a  desperate  struggle  with  the 
King  of  France. 

Alone,  confronted  by  Soulei'man  I.,  Barbaroussa,  and 
Francis  I.,  he  had  to  master  his  undisciplined  army  and  the 
turbulent  Flemish  communes,  organize  the  administration  of 
the  New  World,  extend  his  thought  and  action  from  one  end 
of  the  globe  to  the  other,  from  Buda  to  Mexico,  from  Ghent 
to  Tunis.  Thus  is  explained  his  long  temporizing  in  regard 
to  the  Reformation.  Besides,  the  hatred  of  the  Catholics  for 
the  Protestants  was  not  so  extreme  as  to  willingly  sacrifice  to 
the  emperor  the  liberties  of  Germany;  as  the  day  still  con- 
tinued when  the  citizens  themselves  carried  arms,  there  was 
no  standing  army  with  which  the  emperor  could  be  certain 
of  breaking  down  all  resistance. 

But  after  the  peace  with  France  was  signed  at  Crespy 
(1544)  he  resolved  to  act.  Abandoned  by  the  confederates 
of  Smalkalde,  Francis  I.  abandoned  them  in  turn.  Soulei'- 
man had  just  turned  his  forces  against  Persia.  Charles 
found  himself  then  without  enemies  abroad.  The  ecumen- 
ical council,  to  the  decision  of  which  the  two  parties  had  so 
long  appealed,  had  at  last  assembled  at  Trent  (1545),  and 
after  the  first  sessions  all  hope  of  reconciliation  between  the 
opposing  doctrines  disappeared.  War  was  thenceforward 
inevitable.  Luther  died  happy  in  not  seeing  it  (1546). 

As  always  happens  in  a  confederacy,  disorder  began  in  the 
heart  of  the  Protestant  party.  The  allies  of  Smalkalde  did 
not  know  how  to  concert  their  efforts  and  succumbed  sepa- 
rately. Charles,  on  the  contrary,  showed  firmness  and  de- 
cision, and  despite  the  defection  of  the  Pope  terminated 
everything  in  two  campaigns. 

Upper  Germany  was  subdued  as  early  as  1546 ;  the  death 
of  Francis  I.  at  the  beginning  of  1547  determined  the  em- 
peror to  push  hostilities  more  actively.  At  the  battle  of 
Muhlburg  the  Spanish  infantry  at  the  first  shock  overthrew 
the  Saxon  militia,  and  the  two  chiefs  of  the  league  fell  into  the 
hands  of  Charles  V.;  these  were  the  Elector  of  Saxony,  who 
was  made  prisoner  on  the  field  of  battle,  and  the  Landgrave 


17°  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

of  Hesse,  who  came  to  give  himself  up  (1547).  The  emperor 
applied  to  himself,  but  like  a  Christian,  the  words  of  Caesar. 
"I  came,"  he  said,  "I  saw,  God  conquered." 

Charles  V.  could  then  believe  that  the  dream  so  many 
times  pursued  of  German  unity  was  about  to  be  realized,  that 
the  imperial  power  had  served  its  apprenticeship.  But  he 
was  quickly  undeceived.  He  wished  to  solve  the  religious 
question  without  the  Pope ;  his  interim  of  Augsburg,  a  theo- 
logical formulary  designed  to  bring  the  two  religious  parties 
together,  discontented  everybody  (1548).  He  reserved  for 
his  son  Spain,  the  Netherlands,  Naples,  and  America;  he 
wished  to  assure  him  besides  the  imperial  crown :  his 
brother,  whom  he  had  already  caused  to  be  chosen  King  of 
the  Romans,  and  the  diet  refused  to  consent. 

He  had  filled  the  cities  of  Germany  with  soldiers;  he 
haughtily  dragged  in  his  train  the  two  captive  chiefs  of  the 
Protestants,  and  he  besieged  Magdeburg,  the  only  city  which 
still  resisted;  it  fell  after  a  ten  months'  siege;  but  he  who 
had  just  overthrown  it  had  found  even  in  this  success  the 
means  of  ruining  the  imperial  fortunes.  This  was  Maurice 
of  Saxony.  A  Protestant,  he  had  through  hate  and  ambi- 
tion fought  against  the  Elector  of  Saxony,  his  relative,  and 
the  emperor  had  bestowed  upon  him  the  electoral  dignity  as 
reward.  His  ambition  satisfied,  he  commenced  to  dread 
the  power  of  the  emperor.  He  had  betrayed  his  own  co- 
religionists to  make  his  fortune,  he  betrayed  the  emperor  to 
consolidate  it.  In  order  to  have  a  pretext  for  assembling 
troops  he  obtained  charge  of  the  attack  on  Magdeburg, 
designedly  prolonged  this  siege,  and  while  it  lasted,  negoti- 
ated with  the  Protestants  and  with  Henry  II.,  King  of 
France,  the  treaty  of  Friedewald  (1551).  He  conducted 
everything  with  so  marvelous  secrecy  that  Charles,  the 
most  subtile  politician  of  his  time,  had  not  the  least  sus- 
picion when  he  learned  that  Maurice  had  already  crossed 
Germany  with  powerful  forces,  that  he  was  marching  upon 
Innsbruck,  and  that  he  was  about  to  attack  him  there.  The 
sick  emperor  had  only  time  to  escape  at  midnight,  and, 
carried  in  a  litter  through  the  rain  and  snow,  passed  over 
the  mountains  of  the  Tyrol  (1552).  He  was  obliged  to  set 
the  elector  and  the  landgrave  at  liberty  and  by  the  conven- 
tion of  Passau  to  grant  the  Protestants  entire  freedom  of 
conscience  (1552). 

This.was  giving  a  legal  existence  to  the  new  faith.     The 


CHAP.  XIII.]         REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  171 

peace  of  Augsburg  (1555)  rendered  its  concessions  definite. 
Moreover,  it  confirmed  to  the  actual  holders  their  possession 
of  ecclesiastical  property  secularized  before  the  convention 
of  Passau.  But  the  clause  of  ecclesiastical  reservation  which 
hindered  secularization  in  future  by  obliging  ecclesiastics  to 
resign  their  benefices  before  going  over  to  the  new  faith,  the 
exclusion  of  Calvinists  from  the  peace  of  Augsburg,  finally, 
the  prohibition  of  the  Reformed  faith  outside  the  territories 
of  the  Reformed  princes,  was  to  be  the  source  of  discords, 
and  thence  was  to  arise  the  Thirty  Years'  War. 

In  the  north  of  Europe  the  establishment  of  the  Reforma- 
tion was  provoked  by  causes  and  decided  by  interests  purely 
political.  The  union  of  Calmar  had  just  been  restored  after 
the  battle  of  Bogesund,  where  Sten  Sture,  the  last  of  the 
Swedish  administrators,  had  been  mortally  wounded  (1520). 
Christian  II.,  who  reigned  over  Denmark  and  Norway  from 
1513,  had  himself  proclaimed  hereditary  monarch  of 
Sweden.  He  believed  he  would  consolidate  his  power  by 
getting  rid  of  the  principal  citizens  of  the  country.  In  a 
single  day  94  senators,  prelates  or  rich  burgesses,  were 
beheaded  by  the  ax;  then  600  persons  were  massacred  with- 
out distinction  of  age  or  sex;  gibbets  were  erected  in  every 
city,  and  pitiless  extortions  ruined  the  country. 

Sweden  did  not  long  wait  for  an  avenger.  In  the  follow- 
ing year  Gustavus  Vasa  of  the  ancient  race  of  the  Folkungs 
escaped  from  the  prison  where  Christian  detained  him,  and 
after  adventures  which  have  remained  famous  roused  the 
intrepid  miners  of  Dalecarlia,  cut  in  pieces  the  Danes  near 
Upsal,  and  besieged  Stockholm.  The  city  resisted  two  years 
despite  the  assistance  which  Gustavus  obtained  from  Lubeck. 
At  last  the  Nero  of  the  North  was  deposed  by  the  Danish 
aristocracy,  who  were  less  irritated  by  his  crimes  than  by  his 
predilection  for  humble  people  and  by  his  edicts  in  favor  of 
the  peasants  (1523).  In  his  place  the  nobles  proclaimed 
his  uncle  Frederick,  Duke  of  Holstein,  while  making  him 
swear  to  observe  a  provision  which  ratified  their  privileges, 
restore  to  them  the  right  of  life  and  death  over  the  peasants, 
and  recognize  that  the  crown  was  elective.  On  their  side 
the  States  of  Sweden  offered  the  title  of  king  to  Gustavus 
Vasa,  and  Stockholm  opened  to  him  its  gates  (1523).  The 
following  year  Frederick,  sustained  by  the  powerful  marine 
of  Lubeck,  entered  Copenhagen. 

Gustavus  possessed  hardly  more  than  the  name  of  king. 


172  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.        [BOOK  III. 

He  found  the  soil  in  the  hands  of  the  nobility  and  the  upper 
clergy,  while  the  peasants,  the  burgesses,  and  the  inferior 
priests  were  a  prey  to  destitution  and  ignorance.  Many  in 
Nordland  lived  upon  the  bark  of  trees.  For  his  own  profit 
and  in  the  interest  of  the  people  Gustavus  resolved  to  over- 
throw the  authority  of  the  bishops.  Their  alliance  with  the 
Danes  in  the  last  war  had  rendered  them  odious ;  but  they 
were  so  formidable  through  their  wealth  that  the  king  did 
not  dare  to  attack  them  openly,  and  employed  against  them 
all  the  resources  of  his  unscrupulous  cleverness.  First  he 
tolerated  the  preaching  of  two  Lutherans,  Olaiis  and  Lau- 
rentius  Petri;  then  he  gave  them  his  moral  support  by  nam- 
ing one  State  Secretary  and  the  other  professor  at  the  Univer- 
sity of  Upsal.  Finally,  he  authorized  them  to  publish  their 
translation  of  Scripture  in  the  common  language.  That 
amounted  to  little  :  the  people  did  not  know  how  to  read. 

Then  Gustavus  interested  the  lay  aristocracy  in  his  proj- 
ects. He  permitted  the  nobles  to  demand  back  the  domains 
usurped  by  the  Church  to  the  detriment  of  their  ancestors, 
himself  gave  the  example  by  seizing  a  rich  abbey  which  had 
formerly  belonged  to  his  family,  and  pleading  the  poverty  of 
the  public  treasury,  assigned  to  the  state  two-thirds  of  the 
tithes  and  the  plate  and  bells  of  the  churches  (1526).  At 
the  States  General  of  Westeras  (1524)  the  prestige  of  his 
victories,  the  ascendancy  of  his  authority,and  the  seduction  of 
his  eloquence  charmed  and  took  captive  the  deputies.  The 
States  granted  him  the  right  of  conferring  the  different 
ecclesiastical  dignities,  declared  that  the  domains  of  the 
clergy  belonged  to  the  state,  and  finally  demanded  that 
religion  be  brought  back  to  its  primitive  purity.  Separation 
from  the  Roman  Church,  secularization  of  ecclesiastical 
property,  adhesion  to  the  doctrines  of  Luther — everything 
which  the  Reformation  taught  or  practiced  in  Germany, 
found  itself  sanctioned  and  consecrated  in  Sweden  by  the 
representatives  of  the  nation. 

Gustavus  did  not  lose  an  instant.  His  share  in  the  product 
of  the  tithes  had  permitted  him  to  organize  a  regular 
army.  He  traversed  the  kingdom  with  14,000  men,  every- 
where putting  into  execution  the  decrees  of  Westeras. 
Thirteen  thousand  farms  were  confiscated  to  the  profit  of 
the  king  and  the  nobility.  The  king  could  now  throw  off 
the  mask ;  he  openly  made  confession  of  Lutheranism,  ap- 
pointed Lauren tius  Petri  Archbishop  of  Upsal  and  had  him- 


CHAP.  XIII.]         REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  173 

self  crowned  by  him  (1528).  The  following  year  the  Council 
of  CErebro  regulated  the  doctrines  and  liturgy.  Through 
consideration  for  popular  sentiments  the  hierarchy  and  most 
of  the  ceremonies  of  the  Catholic  Church  were  retained; 
but  in  all  the  rest  the  doctrines  of  the  German  Protestants 
were  adopted. 

The  Reformation  in  Sweden  carried  royalty  to  abso- 
lute power.  Gustavus  Vasa  justified  this  revolution  by 
his  services.  Agriculture,  manufactures,  commerce,  the 
marine,  were  rapidly  developed,  and  Sweden  entered  into 
the  general  system  of  European  politics  by  an  alliance  with 
France  (1542),  which  lasted  almost  without  interruption  till 
the  French  Revolution,  and  which  in  our  time  has  been 
renewed. 

The  preaching  of  Luther  had  early  resounded  in  Denmark. 
In  the  year  1520  Christian  II.  had  called  a  Reformed 
preacher  to  Copenhagen.  His  successor,  Frederick  I.,  won 
to  the  new  ideas  even  before  he  mounted  the  throne,  first 
proclaimed  religious  toleration  so  as  to  leave  the  field  free 
to  the  innovators,  and  in  1525  unreservedly  declared  for  the 
Reformation;  two  years  later  the  diet  of  Odensee  ratified 
liberty  of  conscience,  authorized  the  rupture  of  monastic 
vows  and  the  marriage  of  priests,  and  subjected  the  prelates 
to  the  authority  of  the  king. 

At  the  diet  of  Copenhagen  Frederick  I.  approved  the  con- 
fession of  faith  of  the  Danish  Protestants  (1530).  His  son, 
Christian  III.,  went  farther.  Scarcely  delivered  from  the 
terrible  war  which  brought  about  the  ruin  of  the  Hanse,  he 
overthrew  the  Catholic  hierarchy.  The  bishops  were  de- 
clared deprived  of  their  temporal  and  spiritual  authority;  their 
wealth  was  confiscated  for  the  benefit  of  the  treasury,  and  in 
their  place  seven  superintendents  were  appointed  over  eccle- 
siastical affairs  and  as  many  grand  bailiffs  for  temporal  ad- 
ministration. But  the  Lutheran  clergy  preserved  only  a 
feeble  share  of  the  moral  ascendancy  and  political  influence 
which  the  Catholic  pastors  had  possessed;  and  the  Danish 
aristocracy,  after  having  imposed  on  Christian  III.  the 
capitulation  which  his  brother  had  sworn,  found  no  further 
obstacles  to  its  wishes.  It  suppressed  the  States  General, 
arrogated  to  itself  the  right  of  controlling  the  nominations  to 
all  the  offices,  and  held  the  royalty  in  tutelage  and  the 
people  under  the  harshest  slavery.  This  lasted  120  years 
until  1660,  when  with  the  assistance  of  the  burgesses  and 


174  RE  VOL  UTION  IN  IN  TERES  TS.        [BOOK  1 1 1 . 

Reformed  clergy  the  Danish  royalty  rendered  itself  absolute 
and  hereditary. 

The  Reformation  was  first  preached  in  Switzerland  by  a 

curate  of  Zurich,  Ulrich  Zwingli,  the  contemporary  but  not 

Zwin  H   and     ^  disciple  of  Luther.       As  early  as  1517  he 

Calvin  :      The    had  declared  the  Gospel  the  only  rule  of  faith. 

KifcSSud,1"  One  day  when  t.116  sellers  of  indulgences 
France,  the  begged  him  not  to  impede  their  commerce,  be- 

Netherlands,  ...  .,  , 

and  Scotland  cause  this  money  would  serve  to  build  the 
(1517-59)-  most  beautiful  temple  of  the  universe,  he 

showed  the  people  the  snowy  summit  of  the  Alps,  gilded  by 
the  rays  of  the  setting  sun.  "Behold,"  he  cried,  "the  throne 
of  the  Eternal  ;  contemplate  his  works,  adore  him  in  his 
magnificence;  that  is  worth  more  than  offerings  to  monks  and 
pilgrimages  to  the  bones  of  the  dead."  The  Evangelical 
religion  of  Zwingli  spread  through  the  greater  part  of  Ger- 
man Switzerland,  in  the  commercial  cantons  of  Zurich, 
Berne,  Basel,  Appenzell,  Claris,  and  Schaffhausen.  But  the 
original  cantons  remained  faithful  to  the  Catholic  faith. 
Lucerne,  Uri,  Schwytz,  Unterwalden,  Zug,  Freiburg,  and 
Soleure  formed  in  1528  with  Valais  a  league  for  the  defense 
of  the  Catholic  faith.  The  Reformers  united  in  like  manner 
at  Berne  the  following  year  and  civil  war  became  inevitable. 
For  a  moment  delayed  by  the  efforts  of  a  few  well-meaning 
men  who  caused  a  religious  peace  to  be  signed  (1529),  reli- 
gious animosity  finally  brought  about  bloody  collisions. 
Zwingli  was  slain  soon  after  the  commencement  of  hostili- 
ties. The  Catholics,  conquerors  at  Cappel  and  near  Mt. 
Zug  (1531)  despite  their  inferiority  of  numbers,  imposed 
peace  upon  their  adversaries.  Every  canton  maintained 
the  right  of  regulating  independently  its  own  worship,  but 
the  Evangelical  doctrines  were  excluded  from  the  common 
bailiwicks. 

The  Protestants  found  an  ample  compensation  for  this 
defeat.  Geneva  separated  from  the  Roman  Church.  The 
Reformation  had  been  indigenous  at  Zurich:  it  was  brought 
to  Geneva  by  strangers,  by  Frenchmen.  Governed  by  its 
bishop  under  the  protectorate  of  the  dukes  of  Savoy,  this 
city  found  itself  toward  the  commencement  of  the  sixteenth 
century  divided  into  two  camps.  The  Mamelukes,  or  slaves, 
sustained  the  rights  of  the  duke  Charles  III.,  the  Huguenots 
(jtidgcnosstn,  sworn  confederates)  defended  the  liberties  of 
the  city.  The  Reformation  gave  new  fuel  to  political  ani- 


CHAP.  XIII.]         REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  175 

mosities.  The  Mamelukes  declared  for  the  old  Catholic  faith, 
the  Huguenots  embraced  the  opposite  doctrine.  Thanks 
to  the  support  of  Berne,  the  Huguenot  party  carried  the  day. 
The  city,  protected  by  Francis  I.,  maintained  its  independ- 
ence against  Savoy,  whose  duke  was  deprived  by  Berne 
of  the  country  of  Vaud  (1536). 

At  this  moment  Calvin  arrived.  He  was  a  Frenchman  of 
Noyon  who  had  just  published  his  "Christian  Institutes,"  a 
book  more  formidable  than  the  works  of  Luther  because  it 
was  more  systematic  and  more  audacious;  for  while  the 
doctor  of  Wittenberg  allowed  everything  to  exist  in  the 
Church  which  according  to  him  was  not  condemned  by  the 
word  of  God,  Calvin  wished  to  abolish  everything  which  he 
did  not  find  prescribed  by  the  Gospel.  Forced  to  quit 
France,  then  Italy,  Calvin  found  an  asylum  at  Geneva.  Two 
influences  there  disputed  the  power — that  of  the  political  re- 
formers, who  were  called  libertines,  and  that  of  the  religious 
reformers.  Calvin  secured  the  ascendancy  of  the  latter.  It 
was  not,  however,  without  combat.  The  political  reformers 
succeeded  in  driving  him  from  the  city  (1541),  but  he  was 
recalled,  and  until  his  death  exercised  absolute  power.  He 
organized  the  government  of  Geneva  to  the  almost  exclusive 
profit  of  the  ministers  of  the  Reformed  faith.  By  a  strange 
inconsistency  the  sect  which,  by  accepting  the  sad  and  harsh 
doctrines  of  predestination,  annihilated  all  moral  responsi- 
bility, imposed  upon  itself  the  law  of  a  more  rigid  morality. 
The  city  changed  in  appearance;  to  easy  morals  succeeded 
an  unnatural  puritanism.  No  more  festivals,  no  more  social 
reunions,  no  more  theaters  or  society;  the  rigid  monotony  of 
an  austere  rule  weighed  upon  life.  A  poet  was  decapitated 
because  of  his  verses;  Calvin  wished  adultery  to  be  pun- 
ished by  death  like  heresy,  and  he  had  Michael  Servetus 
burned  who  did  not  entertain  the  same  opinions  as  himself 
upon  the  mystery  of  the  Trinity.  These  men  who  had  so 
much  need  of  toleration  understood  it  no  better  than  their 
adversaries.  The  most  fervent  disciple  of  Calvin,  Theodore 
Beza,  also  demanded  death  for  heretics,  and  accused  the  par- 
liament of  Paris  of  infidelity  because  it  did  not  burn  enough 
witches.  To  which  a  magistrate  replied:  "Better  consult 
our  registers." 

If  the  theocratic  despotism  of  Calvin  deprived  the  Gene- 
vese  of  even  the  most  innocent  enjoyments  of  liberty,  it  is 
right  to  recognize  that  under  this  vigorous  impulse  Geneva 


I?6  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.        [BOOK  III. 

acquired  in  Europe  a  considerable  importance.  It  was 
throughout  the  duration  of  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth 
centuries  the  citadel  and,  as  it  were,  the  sanctuary  of  the 
Reformation.  Calvin  himself  set  the  example  of  the  most 
austere  and  active  life.  He  preached  every  day,  gave  three 
doctrinal  lessons  weekly,  translated  the  Bible  into  French, 
wrote  theological  treatises,  and  replied  to  all  from  all  points 
of  Europe  who  asked  him  questions.  His  correspondence 
would  fill  30  folio  volumes,  and  the  library  of  Geneva 
preserves  2025  of  his  manuscript  sermons. 

When  he  died  in  1564  his  work  was  continued  by  his 
disciples,  Thodore  Beza  in  France,  and  John  Knox  in  Scot- 
land. 

In  consequence  of  the  marriage  of  Maximilian  with  the 
heiress  of  Charles  the  Bold  the  seventeen  provinces  of  the 
Netherlands  had  passed  from  the  house  of  Burgundy  to  that, 
of  Austria.  They  formed  a  sort  of  federal  state  under  the 
superintendence  and  direction  of  a  governor  general  named 
by  the  sovereign;  each  of  them  had  its  constitution  and  its 
representative  assembly.  So  the  authority  of  the  prince  was 
limited  in  the  Netherlands  by  free  institutions,  and  especially 
by  the  independent  spirit  of  the  people.  The  Netherlands 
were  too  near  Germany  for  the  Reformation  not  to  reach 
them  early.  A  translation  of  the  Bible  into  Flemish  appeared 
there  almost  at  the  same  time  as  the  German  translation  of 
Luther,  and  in  Holland  the  survivors  of  Anabaptism,  con- 
quered at  Munster,  took  refuge.  But  Charles  V.,  although 
hampered  by  the  privileges  of  these  cities,  was  more  free 
than  in  the  empire,  would  he  hinder  propagation  of  the  new 
doctrines. 

He  issued  the  most  severe  edicts,  especially  that  of  1550 
after  his  victory  at  Muhlburg  over  the  German  Protestants. 
As  early  as  1522  he  had  set  up  a  special  inqvisition,  and 
many  condemnations  to  death  were  pronounced.  But  these 
rigors  succeeded  only  in  changing  the  nature  of  the  heresy. 
Lutheranism  disappeared  from  the  Netherlands;  Calvinism 
took  its  place,  descending  from  Switzerland  through  Alsace 
or  entering  from  Great  Britain  during  the  reign  of  Edward 
VI.,  thanks  to  the  multiplicity  of  commercial  relations  which 
brought  together  the  two  countries;  it  was  propagated  espe- 
cially in  the  Batavian  provinces.  We  shall  see  later  on  the 
terrible  conflict  which  it  had  to  wage  against  Philip  II. 

Calvinism  also  gained  the  day  in  France.     The  doctrines 


CHAP.  XIII.]         REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  177 

and  writings  of  Luther  had  there  little  success.  On  the 
western  side  of  the  Rhine  theological  science  had  a  center 
in  the  Sorbonne;  the  faith  consequently  found  itself  better 
defended,  and  the  monarch  had  less  need  of  the  Reformation 
in  order  to  lay  his  hand  upon  the  domains  of  the  clergy, 
because  the  concordat  bestowed  upon  the  king  the  disposi- 
tion of  benefices.  Finally,  less  abuses  were  found  in  the 
bosom  of  the  Gallican  clergy,  because  it  had  less  wealth  and 
power;  and  if  many  of  the  provincial  nobles  regretted  the 
domains  formerly  ceded  by  their  fathers  to  the  Church,  if  the 
independent  doctrines  of  the  innovators  pleased  their  feudal 
spirit,  if  desires  after  political  enfranchisement  mingled  with 
their  desires  after  religious  liberty,  the  people  of  the  great 
cities  remained  profoundly  Catholic.  The  Reformation  in 
France  was  for  the  greater  number  a  question  of  conscience 
and  conviction ;  it  was  for  many  also,  sometimes  even  unwit- 
tingly, an  awakening  of  the  aristocratic  spirit,  a  feudal  reac- 
tion against  the  ascendancy  of  royalty  and  the  court. 

Before  Calvin  the  Reformation  made  only  insignificant 
progress.  His  "Christian  Institutes,"  published  by  him  in 
1535,  determined  the  uncertainties  of  the  learned  and  gave  a 
precise  formula  to  their  vague  aspirations.  Calvinism  rapidly 
took  possession  of  a  considerable  portion  of  the  lower  nobil- 
ity, of  a  few  burgesses,  and  of  many  magistrates ;  the  majority 
of  the  great  lawyers  and  men  of  learning  adhered  to  it  in 
public  or  in  secret;  but  with  the  exception  of  the  southern 
provinces,  where  the  recollection  of  the  doctrines  and  war  of 
the  Albigenses  and  more  recently  of  the  scandals  of  Avignon 
kept  alive  profound  resentments  against  the  Roman  Church, 
the  people,  especially  in  the  large  cities,  closed  the  ear  to  the 
new  gospel. 

Francis  I.  was  by  no  means  favorable  to  it,  but  as  against 
Charles  V.  he  had  to  adroitly  secure  alliance  with  the 
German  Protestants.  With  difficulty  could  he  extend  his 
hand  to  Reformers  beyond  the  Rhine  and  at  the  same  time 
have  Reformers  burned  in  France.  Such  is,  however,  the 
continual  and  sad  alternative  which  his  policy  presents.  Is 
he  in  war  with  the  emperor?  He  closes  his  eyes  to  the 
efforts  of  Calvinist  preachers  and  promulgates  the  edict  of 
Coucy,  which  suspends  all  prosecution  on  religious  grounds 
(I535)-  Is  peace  signed,  and  has  he  no  further  need  of  the 
League  of  Smalkalde?  He  seeks  by  punishments  to  arrest 
the  Protestant  propaganda. 


I?8  REVOLUTION  IX  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

At  the  close  of  his  reign,  persuaded  by  the  entreaties  of 
Montmorency  and  Cardinal  de  Tournon,  he  revoked  the 
edict  of  toleration  of  Coucy  and  ordered  the  massacre  of  the 
Waldenses,  whose  creed  was  more  than  three  centuries  old. 
Peaceable  and  paying  the  imposts  regularly,  people  of  pure 
and  simple  customs,  the  Waldenses  inhabited  two  small 
cities,  Merindol  and  Cabrieres,  and  about  thirty  villages  in 
the  Alps  of  Provence,  department  of  Vaucluse;  they  had 
already  been  condemned  as  heretics  in  1540  on  the  demand 
of  the  president  d'Oppede  and  of  Guerin,  advocate  general, 
at  the  parliament  of  Aix;  the  execution  of  the  condemnation 
was  delayed.  But  in  April,  1545,  precise  and  rigorous  orders 
from  the  court  reached  the  parliament  of  Aix.  The  baron 
de  la  Garde,  assisted  by  the  president  d'Oppede  and  the 
advocate  general  Guerin,  entered  unexpectedly  with  soldiers 
upon  the  territory  of  these  unhappy  people.  The  sentence 
ordered  that  the  men  and  women  should  be  burned  alive, 
the  servants  and  children  driven  away,  the  places  rendered 
uninhabitable,  the  forests  utterly  cut  down.  It  was  too 
scrupulously  executed:  3000  Waldenses  were  massacred  or 
burned  in  their  habitations;  550  condemned  to  the  gallows; 
the  others  dispersed  in  the  woods  or  mountains,  where  the 
majority  died  of  hunger  and  misery ;  there  was  not  left  a 
house  or  a  tree  within  fifteen  leagues  (1545). 

Henry  II.  persecuted  the  new  doctrines  rigorously.  The 
edict  of  Chateaubriant  (1551)  ordered  that  Protestants 
should  be  judged  without  appeal,  closed  the  schools  and 
tribunals  to  whoever  had  not  a  certificate  of  orthodoxy,  and 
by  a  usage  borrowed  from  the  worst  days  of  the  Roman  Em- 
pire assured  to  informers  the  third  part  of  the  goods  of  their 
victims.  But  persecution  was  powerless.  In  a  few  years 
the  number  of  Protestant  churches  rose  from  1000  to  2000. 
"Half  the  nobility,  part  of  the  clergy,  and  perhaps  a  tenth 
of  the  people,"  says,  perhaps  with  exaggeration,  a  contemp- 
orary, "were  attached  to  the  Reformation.  Despite  edicts 
and  punishments  they  were  so  obstinate  in  their  religion  that 
even  when  the  government  was  most  determined  to  put 
them  to  death  they  did  not  cease  on  that  account  to  come 
together;  and  the  more  punishments  were  inflicted  the  more 
the  Reformers  multiplied"  (Memoirs  of  Castelnau). 

The  persecution  would  have  certainly  been  violent  with- 
out the  premature  death  of  Henry  II.  At  that  moment  the 
struggle  was  taking  place  even  in  the  heart  of  Parliament, 


CHAP.  XIII.]          REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  179 

and  the  excitement  was  reaching  its  height.  On  the  news 
that  the  Huguenots  had  found  defenders  in  this  great  judicial 
body,  the  king  caused  himself  to  be  carried  into  the  midst 
of  the  magistrates  a  few  days  before  the  fatal  tournament, 
and  had  ordered  that  they  should  in  his  presence  continue 
their  deliberations  upon  the  edicts  published  against  the 
heretics.  T\vo  members,  Dufaur  and  Anne  Dubourg,  did 
not  conceal  their  sympathy  for  the  persecuted;  the  second 
acted  almost  as  an  accuser.  "I  know,"  said  he,  "that  there 
are  certain  crimes  which  must  be  pitilessly  punished,  such 
as  adultery,  blasphemy,  and  perjury;  but  of  what  do  they 
accuse  them  whom  they  surrender  to  the  arm  of  the  execu- 
tioner?" The  king  believing  himself  insulted  and  braved  to 
his  face,  had  them  forthwith  seized,  and  commanded  that 
they  should  be  tried.  His  death  did  not  arrest  the  prose- 
cution, which  went  on  though  attended  by  the  most  terrible 
events.  The  ministers  of  the  Reformed  Church  held  at  Paris 
their  first  national  synod  to  draw  up  a  petition  in  favor  of  the 
prisoners.  On  the  evening  of  December  12,  between  five 
and  six  o'clock,  President  Minard,  a  violent  enemy  of  Du- 
bourg, was  killed  by  a  pistol  shot  when  coming  from  the 
court.  This  shot  slew  also  Dubourg;  he  was  condemned  to 
the  stake  and  burned  in  the  Place  de  Greve.  Persecution 
was  certain,  as  in  the  Netherlands  and  everywhere,  to  bring 
about  plots  and  the  horrible  war  which  we  shall  soon  have 
to  narrate. 

From  France  Calvinism  had  passed  into  Scotland,  a  coun- 
try with  which  France  had  intimate  relations,  and  where  its 
progress  was  facilitated  by  the  natural  disposition  of  the  peo- 
ple and  the  feebleness  of  the  government. 

After  the  premature  death  of  James  V.  (1542)  his  widow, 
Mary  of  Guise,  proclaimed  regent  in  the  name  of  her 
daughter,  Mary  Stuart,  had  left  the  direction  of  affairs  to 
Cardinal  Beaton,  an  able  statesman,  but  of  a  character  harsh 
even  to  cruelty.  Numerous  executions  were  ordered  by 
him  on  the  score  of  religion.  None  excited  general  indig- 
nation to  a  greater  degree  than  that  of  George  Wishart, 
burned  alive  under  the  eyes  of  the  cardinal.  The  Reform 
party  to  avenge  the  death  of  their  co-religionist  assassinated 
Beaton,  whose  body  they  hung  to  the  battlements  of  the 
castle  of  St.  Andrews  (1546). 

From  that  time  the  Reformation  was  propagated  in  Scot- 
land with  rapidity,  although  combated  by  the  regent,  sister 


i8o  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.        [BOOK  III. 

of  the  Guises.  It  was  adopted  by  the  most  illustrious  and 
powerful  families  of  the  country.  John  Knox  put  himself 
at  the  head  of  the  movement.  Many  times  condemned, 
burned  even  in  effigy,  he  fled  to  England,  where  he  became 
chaplain  of  Edward  VI.,  and  after  the  accession  of  Catholic 
Mary  Tudor,  to  Switzerland,  where  he  made  the  acquaint- 
ance of  Calvin.  When  Elizabeth  made  Protestantism  tri- 
umph in  England  Knox  was  recalled  from  Geneva.  A 
disciple  of  Calvin,  he  organized  the  Scotch  Church  after  the 
model  of  the  Genevan  Church.  The  hierarchy  was  abolished; 
in  Presbyterianism,  the  name  assumed  by  the  Church  of 
Scotland,  all  the  ministers  are  equal.  Knox  would  have 
desired  to  consecrate  the  domains  of  the  Catholic  clergy  to 
the  maintenance  of  the  new  faith;  but  these  had  been  seized 
and  were  retained  by  the  nobles.  He  was  more  happy  in 
his  efforts  against  Catholic  monuments.  Churches,  libraries, 
record  offices,  tombs  even,  nothing  whatsoever  which  seemed 
tainted  with  idolatry,  found  mercy  with  this  furious  icono- 
clast (1560).  So  the  Scotch  Reformation  bore  from  the  be- 
ginning a  character  of  peculiar  violence  and  fanaticism. 

England  had  always  manifested  a  spirit  of  independence 

which  often  went  as  far  as  heresy.     Thus  in  the  fourteenth 

D  .       century  Wycliffe   and  the  Lollards  his  disci- 

ine         Ketor-  .  J   .      J 

mation  in  Eng-  pies,  had  encountered  the  most  active  sympa- 
land  (1531-52).  thy;  and  distrust,  if  not  hatred,  against  Rome 
was  as  prevalent  among  the  clergy  as  among  the  people.  It 
was,  however,  a  vulgar  and  guilty  incident,  the  love  of  Henry 
VIII.  for  Anne  Boleyn,  which  brought  about  the  schism  of 
England.  Henry  VIII.  had  been  married  twenty-four  years 
to  Catherine  of  Aragon  when  one  day,  in  1527,  he  discovered 
he  was  a  relative  of  his  wife  in  a  degree  prohibited  by  the 
canons  of  the  Church.  He  demanded  of  the  Pope  a  decla- 
ration that  the  marriage  was  null.  Clement  was  the  prisoner 
of  Charles  V.,  and  Charles  V.  was  the  uncle  of  Catherine. 
"I  find  myself,"  wrote  the  pontiff,  "between  the  anvil  and 
the  hammer."  He  negotiated;  but  the  king,  impatient  at 
his  delays,  had  his  Parliament  proclaim  him  protector  and 
supreme  chief  of  the  Church  of  England  (1531);  the  follow- 
ing year  he  married  Anne  Boleyn.  Clement  VII.  issued  a 
sentence  of  excommunication  against  the  king.  The  always 
docile  Parliament  decreed  the  suppression  of  the  monastic 
orders,  and  the  king  confiscated  the  property  of  the  monas- 
teries (1536). 


CHAP.  XIII.]  REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  181 

Henry  VIII.  when  separating  from  the  Holy  See  pretended, 
however,  to  remain  orthodox :  he  remembered  having  written 
against  Luther;  and  in  his  charters  and  diplomatic  protocols 
with  equal  pride  employed  his  title  of  Defender  of  the  Faith 
and  King  of  France.  Woe  to  the  Catholic  who  denied  the 
religious  supremacy  of  the  king:  he  was  beheaded  !  Woe  to 
the  Dissenter  who  denied  the  real  presence:  he  was  burned! 

As  early  as  1531  punishments  commenced.  Three  Prot- 
estants were  burned  that  none  should  doubt  the  orthodoxy 
of  the  king ;  in  1535  he  beheaded  the  cardinal  bishop  Fisher, 
who  disapproved  of  the  king's  divorce,  and  the  chancellor 
Thomas  More,  who  refused  to  acknowledge  his  religious 
supremacy.  The  latter  was  a  beautiful  character,  and  one  of 
the  noblest  spirits  of  the  century.  From  that  day  the  volup- 
tuous and  sanguinary  Henry  VIII.  put  England  in  mind  of 
the  most  frightful  tyrants  of  Rome.  He  espoused  six  wives, 
repudiated  two,  Catherine  of  Aragon  (1532)  and  Anne  of 
Cleves  (1540),  and  sent  two  to  the  scaffold,  Anne  Boleyn,  the 
cause  of  the  schism  (1536),  and  Catherine  Howard  for  irreg- 
ularities prior  to  her  union  with  the  king  (1542);  a  third, 
Catherine  Parr,  came  near  ascending  it  on  account  of  her 
religious  beliefs.  The  sixth,  Jane  Seymour,  whom  he  had 
espoused  after  Anne  Boleyn,  had  died  in  giving  birth  to 
the  prince  who  became  Edward  VI.  (1537).  When  Parlia- 
ment, in  order  to  teach  the  English  what  they  should  believe 
and  what  they  should  not  believe,  had  adopted  the  Bill  of 
Six  Articles,  which  the  Reformers  called  the  Bill  of  Blood 
(1539),  an  inquisition  more  terrible  than  that  of  Spain 
covered  England  with  funeral  piles.  Among  the  victims 
are  counted  2  queens,  2  cardinals,  3  archbishops,  18 
bishops,  13  abbots,  500  priors  or  monks,  14  archdeacons, 
60  canons,  more  than  50  doctors,  12  dukes,  marquises,  or 
earls,  29  barons,  335  nobles,  no  women  of  rank;  in  all 
72,000  capital  condemnations.  Never  revolution  had  im- 
purer  sources  and  was  established  by  ways  more  bloody 
and  more  shameful.  To  murder  was  added  spoliation. 
All  the  real  and  personal  property  of  the  monasteries  had 
been  seized  by  the  king.  It  was  not  enough.  He  multiplied 
fines,  confiscations,  imposts,  debased  the  currency,  and 
despite  all  his  extortions,  loaded  with  debts,  became  bank- 
rupt to  settle  his  accounts.  This  bankruptcy  was,  more- 
over, not  made  according  to  ordinary  legal  forms.  Parlia- 
ment by  a  special  act  dispensed  the  king  from  restoring  what 


182  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

he  had  borrowed.  This  same  Parliament  had  given  the 
force  of  law  to  the  royal  ordinances.  Thus  the  English, 
who  thought  they  abandoned  only  their  political  liberty 
when,  after  the  War  of  the  Roses,  they  allowed  Henry  VII. 
to  seize  absolute  power,  now  saw  the  money,  the  blood,  the 
creed  even,  of  the  nation  sacrificed  to  an  abominable  tyrant. 

But  by  publishing  a  translation  of  the  Bible  in  the  common 
tongue  Henry  VIII.  became  without  wishing  it  a  propagator 
of  heresy.  Besides  the  royal  reform,  which  was  limited  to 
some  insignificant  modification  of  the  liturgy  and  to  the  sup- 
pression of  the  authority  of  the  Holy  See,  there  sprang  up  a 
popular  reform,  which  deviated  widely  from  "the  Catholic 
doctrines  and  discipline.  Prosecuted  implacably  by  the  de- 
fenders of  the  official  faith,  the  Dissenters  wished  to  acquire 
religious  liberty,  and  were  to  make  common  cause  with  the 
promoters  of  political  liberty.  The  fall  of  the  Stuarts  and  of 
despotism  in  England  was  to  have  no  other  cause. 

Schismatic  but  orthodox  with  Henry  VIII.,  England  under 
Edward  VI.  renounced  the  Catholic  doctrine.  The  regent 
Somerset,  very  zealous  for  the  Reformation,  proscribed  the 
mass,  ordered  the  use  of  the  Bible  in  the  common  tongue, 
abolished  saints'  days,  and  allowed  the  laity  to  partake  of  both 
elements  in  the  communion  (1548).  Warwick,  who  over- 
turned Somerset  (1549)  and  had  him  executed  three  years 
later,  was  Catholic  at  the  bottom  of  his  heart;  but  he  needed 
the  Protestants,  and  he  leaned  upon  them  to  keep  away  from 
the  throne  the  princess  Mary,  daughter  of  Catherine  of 
Aragon. 

And  in  effect  scarcely  had  Edward  VI.  expired,  before 
attaining  his  seventeenth  year,  when  Warwick  proclaimed 
Jane  Grey,  a  young  woman  interesting  for  her  learning  and 
her  virtues,  but  who  had  only  remote  rights  to  the  throne, 
being  great-granddaughter  of  Henry  VII. 

Such  was  the  veneration  of  the  English  for  the  blood  of 
their  kings  that  they  respected  the  principle  of  heredity  even 
when  it  was  opposed  to  their  interests  or  passions.  War- 
wick was  abandoned  even  by  the  Protestants,  and  the 
unhappy  Lady  Jane  Grey  paid  with  her  life  for  the  ten  days' 
reign  which  the  ambition  of  another  had  imposed  upon  her 

(i553)- 

Mary  openly  declared  herself  Catholic,  re-established 
bishops  who  had  refused  the  oath  of  supremacy  and  punished 
those  who  had  taken  it.  Then  she  espoused  the  son  of 


CHAP.  XIII.]         REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  183 

Charles  V.,  her  cousin  Philip  II.,  in  spite  of  the  entreaties  of 
the  Commons  and  against  the  wish  of  the  nation.  Then 
England  was  solemnly  reconciled  with  the  Holy  See.  The 
possessors  of  monastic  property  had  declared  themselves 
ready  to  re-enter  the  Catholic  Church  provided  they  were 
guaranteed  the  peaceful  retention  of  what  they  had  taken 
( 1554)-  But  from  this  moment  also  punishments  began;  be- 
tween February,  1555,  and  September,  1558,  400  Reformers 
perished,  290  of  them  by  fire.  The  Protestants  stigmatized 
Queen  Mary  with  the  surname  of  "Bloody,"  a  title  which 
would  fit  just  as  well  their  great  Queen  Elizabeth.  Besides, 
Mary  was  unhappy  all  her  life.  Persecuted  during  her  youth, 
she  saw  herself  upon  the  throne  disdained  by  the  ungrateful 
Philip  II.,  to  whom  she  had  devoted  all  her  affection.  He 
drew  her  into  a  war  against  France :  England  lost  Calais. 
Mary  survived  this  disaster  only  a  few  months.  She  several 
times  repeated  before  expiring  that  if  her  heart  was  opened, 
on  it  would  be  found  written  the  word  Calais  (1558).  The 
premature  death  of  Mary  Tudor  caused  her  sister,  Elizabeth, 
the  Protestant  daughter  of  Anne  Boleyn,  to  ascend  the  throne. 
Till  then  she  had  concealed  her  religious  sentiments,  and  at 
first  she  appeared  to  hesitate  as  to  the  religious  question. 
She  even  had  herself  crowned  according  to  the  Catholic  ritual, 
and  she  charged  the  English  ambassador  at  the  Papal  See  to 
notify  Pope  Paul  IV.  of  her  accession.  Elizabeth  would  cer- 
tainly have  declared  for  the  Reformation,  but  the  haughty  and 
violent  reply  of  the  pontiff  precipitated  her  decision.  Febru- 
ary 18, 1559,  the  House  of  Lords  declared  the  queen  supreme 
ruler  of  the  Church  as  well  as  of  the  state.  All  the  religious 
laws  of  Mary  were  annulled.  An  oath  implying  the  rebirth 
of  the  spiritual  supremacy  of  the  crown  was  imposed  on 
whoever  had  the  least  connection  with  the  government.  All 
the  bishops,  with  the  exception  of  one  alone,  refused  and  were 
removed;  but  of  7386  ecclesiastics  of  the  second  class  only 
180  curates  and  95  incumbents  imitated  this  disinterested- 
ness. The  organization  of  the  English  Church  was  not  regu- 
lated till  three  years  after  by  the  Bill  of  the  Thirty-nine 
Articles  (1562).  The  new  religion  maintained  the  episcopal 
hierarchy,  and  its  clergy  is  to-day  by  far  the  richest  of  all 
Christendom.  Born  at  the  call  of  temporal  power,  it  has 
continued  constantly  devoted  to  it,  and  has  carefully  nour- 
ished hatred  of  the  papacy  among  the  English  people. 
Since  the  year  1532  England,at  least  the  official  class  of  that 


184  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.         [BOOK  III. 

country,  changed  its  religion  four  times  according  to  the 
caprice  of  its  princes — a  sad  spectacle  which  was  presented 
nowhere  else,  and  which  reveals  the  power  acquired  by  the 
royalty  under  the  Tudors.  Up  to  that  time  these  changes 
had  only  been  an  affair  of  internal  administration;  but  the 
religious  question  was  going  to  become  national,  and  the 
Reformation  to  be  profoundly  rooted  in  English  soil  by  the 
efforts  even  which  foreigners  might  make  for  its  extirpation. 
Beginning  with  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  Protestantism  became 
a  part  of  English  patriotism  to  a  degree  that  those  were  not 
far  from  being  considered  as  traitors  who  remained  attached 
to  the  Roman  Church,  and  who,  in  reality  placing  their  con- 
science above  their  country,  for  a  long  time  lived  in  perma- 
nent conspiracy  against  the  new  order. 

Thus  in  less  than  fifty  years,  Switzerland,  Great  Britain, 
Sweden,  half  of  Germany,  and  a  part  of  France  had  sepa- 
rated from  Catholicism.  Christianity,  which  in 
ferencesPamong   the  Middle  Ages  had  been  so  strongly  united, 
the    Protestant  found  itself  divided.      The  Roman  religion 

churches.  ... 

prevailed  in  the  south  of  Europe,  Protestant- 
ism in  the  north.  But  since  the  Protestant  principles  in- 
culcated free  interpretation  of  Scripture  there  was  always 
produced  in  the  bosom  of  the  Reformation  a  quantity  of  sects 
whose  number  constantly  increased. 

However,  three  great  systems  predominated — Lutheran- 
ism,  Calvinism,  and  Anglicanism.  The  first  was  generally 
adopted  in  the  north  of  Germany  and  the  Scandinavian 
states;  the  second  in  Switzerland,  France,  the  Netherlands, 
and  Scotland;  the  third,  as  its  name  indicates,  in  England. 

They  had  a  common  dogma,  which  is  the  true  basis  of 
Protestantism,  the  doctrine  of  justification  by  grace.  Luther 
defended  it  against  Erasmus  in  his  book  "De  Servo  Arbitrio," 
where  are  found  peculiar  maxims  touching  the  uselessness  of 
good  works  for  salvation,  even  the  inoperativeness  of  bad 
works  for  damnation,  faith  alone  sufficing  for  justification. 
Calvin  carried  this  doctrine  to  its  farthest  and  unnatural  con- 
sequences by  teaching  the  predestination  of  election  and 
damnation. 

Of  the  three  Reformed  churches  the  farthest  removed 
from  Catholicism  was  Calvinism.  The  Calvinists  in  fact  like 
the  Sacramentarians  utterly  rejected  the  dogma  of  the  real 
presence,  and  saw  in  the  eucharist,  not  the  effective  sacrifice 
of  Jesus  Christ,  but  a  simple  commemoration  of  the  Supper. 


CHAP.  XIII.]         REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  185 

The  Lutherans  did  not  admit  transubstantiation,  that  is  to 
say,  the  change  of  the  elemental  bread  and  wine  into  the  body 
and  blood  of  the  Saviour;  they  believed,  however,  that  Jesus 
Christ  was  there  present  as  is  fire  in  a  hot  iron,  to  borrow 
the  comparison  of  Luther  himself.  So  instead  of  accepting 
the  mystery  like  the  Catholics,  or  of  denying  it  like  the  Cal- 
vinists,  they  replaced  it  by  another  more  complicated,  to 
which  they  gave  the  eccentric  names  of  impanation  and  invin- 
ation.  As  to  the  Anglicans,  they  were  separated  from  the 
Catholics  upon  this  fundamental  dogma  by  ambiguous 
expressions,  the  confession  of  faith  of  the  Anglican  Church 
in  1562  having  designedly  avoided  pronouncing  upon  this 
question,  declaring  at  once  that  the  Supper  is  the  com- 
munion of  the  body  and  blood  of  Jesus  Christ,  but  that  the 
communicant  receives  Jesus  Christ  only  spiritually.  At 
basis  the  Anglicans  are  Calvin ists  by  dogma  and  Catholics 
by  liturgy.  Of  the  seven  sacraments  of  the  Catholic  Church 
the  Calvinists  recognize  only  two,  baptism  and  the  Lord's 
Supper — the  first  considered  as  a  simple  undertaking  to 
bring  up  the  child  in  a  Christian  manner,  the  second  stripped 
of  every  mystery,  neither  being  essential  to  salvation;  the 
Lutherans  also  accept  two,  baptism  and  the  eucharist,  but 
transforming  the  latter,  which  was  received  by  the  Anglicans 
in  such  terms  as  diminished  the  distance  between  their 
Church  and  that  of  the  Catholics.  Besides,  the  Protestant 
communions  agreed  in  rejecting  the  five  other  sacraments,  in- 
asmuch as  confirmation  and  ordination  of  priests,  retained  by 
the  Anglicans,  were  not  regarded  as  sacraments,  but  simply 
as  pious  rites;  and  even  if  they  advise  confession  on  the  bed 
of  death  they  do  not  make  of  it  an  imperative  requirement. 
It  is  especially  in  their  discipline  that  the  Reformed 
churches  differed  from  each  other.  We  must  not  be  aston- 
ished at  this,  for  the  Reformation  had  as  its  occasion  and 
principal  cause  the  abuses  which  had  been  introduced  among 
the  clergy.  In  this  connection  the  Protestant  faiths  adopted 
two  principal  methods  of  organization.  Lutheranism  admitted 
a  certain  hierarchy;  the  Calvinist  system  rested  upon  the 
principle  of  equality  of  the  ministers  among  themselves.  In 
Great  Britain  the  two  systems  reached  their  most  complete 
development.  Thus  the  Anglican  Church  with  its  archbish- 
ops, its  bishops,  its  different  degrees  in  the  priesthood,  its 
liturgy,  its  immense  revenues,  its  colleges,  and  its  establish- 
ments of  instruction  and  charity,  differed  almost  in  nothing 


186  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS.        [BOOK  III. 

from  the  exterior  organization  of  Catholic  churches,  save  in 
simplicity  of  costume,  the  cold  austerity  of  its  worship,  the 
employment  of  the  vulgar  tongue,  and  the  marriage  of  priests. 
Subjected  to  royal  supremacy,  its  existence  was  intimately 
united  with  the  maintenance  of  the  monarchy,  and  the 
clergy  was  in  England  the  surest  support  of  royalty. 

Its  neighbor,  the  Presbyterian  Church  of  Scotland,  on  the 
contrary  had  democratic  tendencies.  There  no  distinctions 
whatsoever  of  rank  or  wealth  existed  among  the  members  of 
the  clergy.  Hardly  are  they  separated  from  the  people  by 
the  nature  of  their  functions.  The  Puritan  sects  speedily 
suppressed  all  special  delegation  of  priesthood.  Every 
Christian  who  had  talent  or  inspiration  was  considered  fit  for 
the  divine  ministry.  In  the  Scandinavian  states  bishops 
were  retained  under  the  name  of  superintendents,  but  the 
Lutheran  bishops  kept  nothing  of  the  wealth  and  the  politi- 
cal influence  of  their  Catholic  predecessors.  The  princes 
or  the  sovereigns  had  exercised  great  care  in  confining  their 
new  clergy  within  the  strictest  limits  of  comfort,  and  in 
excluding  them  entirely  from  temporal  affairs.  But  if  the 
confusion  of  these  two  powers  had  had  deplorable  results  in 
the  Middle  Ages,  the  subordination  of  the  Church  to  the 
state  in  Lutheran  countries  had  the  unhappy  effect  of  depriv- 
ing the  ministers  of  the  independence  and  dignity  necessary 
to  their  functions. 

The  Calvinist  churches  were  poorer  still ;  but  as  they  owed 
their  origin  only  to  themselves  they  enjoyed  great  liberty  and 
a  considerable  moral  empire.  At  Geneva,  in  France  and 
Scotland,  magistrates  and  lords  were  more  than  once  com- 
pelled to  listen  to  the  energetic  voice  of  their  pastors. 

To  recapitulate,  the  religious  unity  of  Europe  was  broken, 
and  in  the  camp  of  the  Reformers  dissenting  sects  abounded. 
Born  of  the  spirit  of  revolt,  the  Reformation  was  at  first  un- 
faithful to  its  character.  The  Anglicans  and  Lutherans 
intrusted  to  their  princes  the  spiritual  power  which  they  had 
refused  the  Pope,  so  that  those  who  held  the  sword  with  one 
hand  were  seen  with  the  other  to  write  articles  of  faith,  and 
to  impose  them  under  penalty  of  death  or  exile. 

"Luther  has  placed  upon  our  head,"  said  the  gentle  Me- 
lancthon,  "a  yoke  of  iron  instead  of  a  yoke  of  wood."  In 
these  countries  the  religious  revolution  contributed  its  aid  to 
the  political  revolution,  since  to  the  rights  of  princes  it  added 
one  newer  still,  that  of  governing  the  conscience.  This  was 


CHAP.  XIII.]          REVOLUTION  IN  CREEDS.  187 

also  borrowed  from  the  usages  of  imperial  Rome,  natural 
consequence  of  a  Reformation  which  claimed  to  be  only  a 
return  to  apostolic  times. 

The  Calvinists  after  the  hard  domination  of  Calvin 
remembered  what  was  their  origin.  They  acknowledged 
spiritual  power  only  in  the  assembly  of  the  faithful,  that  is 
to  say,  in  the  Church  itself.  Besides,  the  political  con- 
stitution of  the  majority  of  Calvinist  countries — Switzer- 
land, Holland,  Scotland — prepared  this  solution. 

In  Switzerland  especially  the  best  employment  had  been 
made  of  Church  property  by  founding  hospitals  and  schools. 
In  general,  Protestantism,  replacing  almost  all  worship  by 
reading  and  meditation  upon  the  Bible,  widely  diffused  pri- 
mary instruction  among  the  people. 

We  have  just  seen  that  in  politics  this  rebellion  against 
spiritual  authority  resulted  in  many  places  in  a  greater  sub- 
jection to  the  temporal  power;  it  likewise  happened  in 
general  civilization  that  this  insurrection  of  the  spirit  of 
examination  at  first  in  no  way  profited  the  progress  of 
general  intelligence. 

In  Germany  all  intellects  were  turned  toward  theology. 
Ancient  letters  were  left  aside  that,  as  in  the  good  days  of 
scholasticism,  men  should  be  occupied  by  questions  puerile 
because  they  were  insolvable.  The  Renaissance  died  from 
this  cause;  painters  and  poets  disappeared  before  the  icono- 
clastic fury  of  one  party  and  the  theological  passions  of 
another;  but  the  Adiaphorists,  the  Synergists,  the  Accident- 
aries,  the  Substantialists,  the  Crypto-Calvinists,  swarmed 
and  presented  the  impious  spectacle  of  men  who  claimed  to 
regulate  the  affairs  of  heaven,  to  measure  the  power  of  God, 
to  determine  his  action  and  to  draw  up  his  decrees:  this 
did  not  prevent  them  from  constantly  having  in  their  mouth 
words  of  hate  and  death  when  speaking  of  Him  who  has 
spread  everywhere  over  the  world  life  and  love. 

We  shall  see  shortly  that  the  contrecoup  of  the  Reforma- 
tion produced  like  consequences  in  Italy  and  Spain. 

Luther  and  Calvin — the  former  who  surrendered  to  princes 
the  spiritual  power,  the  latter  who  burned  Michael  Servetus 
— are  therefore  in  no  point  of  view  the  fathers  of  modern 
liberty,  as  their  partisans  have  wished  to  call  them.  But  in 
the  field  where  man  plows  and  sows  very  often  springs  up 
a  harvest  which  he  does  not  expect.  Denial  of  authority  in 
the  spiritual  order  inevitably  conducted  to  denial  of  authority 


1 88  REVOLUTION  IN  INTERESTS. 

in  the  philosophic  and  social  order.  Luther  and  Calvin, 
although  without  wishing  it,  led  to  Bacon  and  Descartes  as 
Bacon  and  Descartes  unwittingly  led  to  Locke  and  Mira- 
beau;  so  one  can  say  that  the  religious  revolution  of  the 
sixteenth  century,  like  the  philosophical  revolution  of  the 
seventeenth  century,  perished  in  its  affirmations  but  tri- 
umphed in  its  methods.  The  enslaved  will  of  Luther,  the 
predestination  of  Calvin,  have  gone  to  seek  the  vortices  of 
Descartes,  but  the  spirit  which  animated  them  has  survived 
like  Cartesian  doubt,  and  is  the  soul  of  our  time. 

It  is  curious  to  see  that  the  great  work  of  modern  civiliza- 
tion, arrested  in  the  countries  where  the  two  opposing  doc- 
trines reached  their  most  complete  expression,  was  continued 
by  that  land  which,  repudiating  both  Luther  and  the  Inqui- 
sition, proclaimed  as  early  as  the  sixteenth  century  through 
two  of  its  great  men,  L'Hopitaland  Henry  IV.,  the  necessity 
of  religious  toleration.  The  France  of  Jean  Goujon  and  of 
Corneille,  of  Poussin  and  Moliere,  grasped  the  scepter  of 
arts  and  literature  which  had  fallen  from  the  failing  hands 
of  Italy,  and  holds  it  still. 

In  one  aspect  the  religious  revolution  is  attached  also  to 
the  economic  revolution.  In  Protestant  countries  the  dimi- 
nution of  saints'  days  increased  the  hours  of  labor  as  the 
closing  of  the  monasteries  multiplied  the  number  of  laborers. 
Production  became  greater,  and  consequently  products 
cheaper.  Here  is  found  one  of  the  reasons  for  the  commercial 
and  industrial  superiority  of  Protestant  countries  to  those 
which  have  remained  strictly  Catholic,  as  Italy,  Spain, 
Bavaria,  and  Austria. 


BOOK  IV. 

THE  CATHOLIC  RESTORATION   AND   THE   RE- 
LIGIOUS  WARS.— PREPONDERANCE  OF  SPAIN. 


CHAPTER   XIV. 


THE  COUNCIL  OF  TRENT  AND  THE  CATHOLIC  RES- 
TORATION. 


Reforms  at  the  Pontifical  Court  and  Attempts  at  Reconciliation  with  the 
Protestants. — Defensive  Measures :  The  Inquisition  (1542),  the 
Index,  the  Jesuits. — Council  of  Trent  (1545-63). 


THE  papacy,  unexpectedly  attacked,  had  in  a  few  years 

lost  half  of  its  empire.     The  necessity  of  reformation  in 

_,  ,  the  morals  and  discipline  of  the  Church  had 

Reforms  at  the  _  ,  1111 

pontifical  court  at  first  been  the  text  developed  by  all  the 
tt  recon^mati^n  enemies  of  the  Holy  See.  It  was  necessary  to 
with  the  Protes-  deprive  them  of  this  weapon.  This  the  suc- 
cessors of  Clement  VII.  understood;  there- 
upon commenced  at  the  pontifical  court  and  through  all  the 
Catholic  Church  an  admirable  undertaking.  To  reform 
ecclesiastical  discipline,  to  impose  purity  of  morals  upon  the 
clergy,  to  awaken  the  faith  of  the  people — this  was  the 
achievement  attempted  by  Paul  III.,  Paul  IV.,  Pius  IV., 
Pius  V.,  and  Sixtus  V.,  the  pontiffs  who  governed  the 
Church  during  the  latter  half  of  the  sixteenth  century. 

Paul  III.,  who  in  certain  respects  belonged  to  the  preced- 
ing age,  inaugurated  this  new  policy  by  raising  to  the  car- 
dinalate  only  men  distinguished  by  their  talents  and  virtues. 
The  Protestants  themselves  could  only  applaud  the  promo- 
tion of  such  prelates  as  Contarini,  Sadoleto,  Caraffa,  and 


19°  THE  CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.          [ BOOK  IV. 

Ghiberti.  The  tribunal  of  the  rota,*  the  penitentiary,  the 
Roman  chancery,  received  a  better  organization.  The  abuse 
of  dispensations  and  simony  was  prosecuted,  and  there  was  a 
moment  when  this  labor  seemed  leading  to  the  desired  end, 
to  a  reconciliation  with  the  Protestants ;  for  the  most  revered 
counselors  of  the  Pope,  especially  Contarini,  admitted  the 
fundamental  dogma  of  the  Protestants,  justification  by  grace, 
and  showed  an  ardent  desire  to  introduce  reforms  into 
morals  and  discipline. 

At  the  Colloquy  of  Ratisbon  in  1541,  where  the  wise  Con- 
tarini had  come  as  papal  legate,  one  might  believe  peace 
concluded.  The  emperor,  who  was  making  ready  for  a  great 
war  against  France,  earnestly  desired  to  reach  a  compromise. 
Luther  himself,  worn  out  by  his  struggles  against  the  Ana- 
baptists and  Sacramentarians,  disenchanted  when  he  saw 
the  princes  take  possession  of  the  Reformation  for  their 
own  profit,  did  not  seem  to  have  been  very  strongly  averse. 
The  Protestants  sent  to  the  conference  their  most  pacific 
theologians,  Bucer  and  Melancthon.  But  the  Reformed 
princes  were  less  docile  than  the  doctors.  They  interfered 
in  the  discussion;  they  drew  up  articles  "to  please  them- 
selves," said  Luther.  "Our  excellent  prince, "he  added, 
"has  allowed  me  to  read  the  conditions  which  he  wishes  to 
propose  in  order  to  have  peace  with  the  emperor  and  our 
adversaries.  I  see  that  they  look  upon  all  this  matter  as  a 
comedy  which  they  are  acting,  while  it  is  a  tragedy  between 
God  and  Satan  where  Satan  triumphs  and  God  is  sacrificed. 
But  the  catastrophe  will  come."  This  is  from  his  letter  of 
April  5,  1541.  The  princes,  in  effect,  who  had  seized  the 
property  of  the  Church,  could  not  wish  for  a  peace  which 
would  have  condemned  them  to  restitution,  or  which  would 
at  least  have  hindered  their  encroachments. 

There  was  also  a  secret  opposition  on  the  part  of  some 
Catholics.  Francis  I.  was  afraid  of  the  influence  which  this 
pacification  would  give  the  emperor  in  the  empire.  A  united 
Germany  seemed  to  him  an  object  of  dread.  Others,  like 
the  Archbishop  of  Cologne,  feared  the  price  at  which  peace 
would  be  bought.  "We  should  be  compelled,"  he  wrote 
the  Pope,  "to  make  too  many  concessions."  Contarini 

*  So  named  because  a  large  circular  mosaic  (rota,  wheel),  adorned  the 
room  where  the  members  met.  This  tribunal  was  composed  of  eleven 
doctors  of  theology,  chosen  from  France,  Germany,  Italy,  and  Spain, 
and  empowered  to  decide  all  matters  having  reference  to  ecclesiastical 
benefices. 


CHAP.  XIV.]  THE   COUNCIL   OF   TRENT.  191 

was  disavowed  by  the  Pope  as  the  Protestant  doctors  had 
been  by  their  princes. 

The  hope  of  reconciliation  being  lost,  the  Church  armed 
herself  for  the  combat. 

In  1542  a  new  Inquisition,  of  which  the  superior  tribunal 

sat  at  Rome,  was  instituted.     Six  inquisitors  general   had 

Defensive          the  mission  of  seeking  out  and  punishing  on 

measures :    The   either  side  of  the  mountains  every  attack  upon 

Inquisition  (1542),     ,          ,    .   ,  XT    .  ,  ,  <•  ,, 

the  index,  the  the  faith.  Neither  rank  nor  dignity  could 
deliver  from  their  jurisdiction.  They  had  the 
right  to  incarcerate  suspected  persons,  to  inflict  capital 
punishment  upon  the  guilty,  and  to  sell  their  goods.  It  was 
enjoined  upon  them,  in  a  word,  to  do  everything  to  stifle  and 
extirpate  the  heresies  which  had  burst  forth  in  the  Christian 
community.  The  Inquisition  commenced  its  task  with  so 
much  energy  that  the  highways  leading  from  Italy  into 
Switzerland  and  Germany  were  covered  with  fugitives.  Ap- 
prehension reigned  from  one  end  of  the  peninsula  to  the 
other.  Even  the  Duchess  of  Ferrara,  daughter  of  France 
though  she  was,  was  endangered.  "She  mingled  tears  with 
her  wine,"  said  Marot.  The  academies  were  broken  up  at 
Modena  and  Naples.  All  examination  in  matters  of  faith  was 
forbidden ;  everything  that  breathed  novelty  was  watched  and 
proscribed.  The  Congregation  of  the  Index  was  established 
and  the  lists  of  prohibited  books  were  multiplied;  no  ancient 
or  modern  work  could  be  printed  without  the  permission 
of  the  inquisitors.  In  all  Italy,  Venice  alone  subordinated 
the  inquisitor  to  civil  authority.  A  cardinal  and  bishop  were 
thrown  into  prison,  individuals  of  less  rank  were  drowned 
or  burned.  These  means  succeeded,  and  Catholic  unity  and 
orthodoxy  were  saved  in  the  peninsula,  but  at  what  a  price! 
The  subjection  of  the  Italians  to  the  house  of  Austria  had 
slain  political  life:  the  measures  to  extirpate  or  prevent 
heresy  slew  intellectual  life.  Men  ceased  to  think;  art  de- 
clined like  letters,  and  Italy  became  a  land  of  the  dead.  Did 
morals  gain?  The  cicisbeos  and  the  bandits  answer  as  to 
private  and  public  morality.  Where  neither  citizens  nor 
soldiers  nor  artists  nor  poets  nor  writers  were  found,  could 
one  find  men?  The  Inquisition  was  considered  only  a 
measure  of  defense:  it  was  necessary  to  attack  the  Reforma- 
tion in  its  home.  Catholicism  had  retreated  long  enough; 
the  thing  was  to  march  forward.  The  Holy  See  multiplied 
the  pious  militia  which  combated  for  it. 


192  THE  CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.  [BOOK  IV. 

All  the  great  epochs  of  the  Church  are  marked  by  the 
creation  of  new  monastic  orders  or  by  the  reform  of  those 
already  existing:  hence  the  reform  of  the  monasteries  under 
the  Carlovingians;  that  of  the  rule  of  St.  Benedict  in  the 
tenth  and  eleventh  centuries;  the  creation  of  the  mendicant 
orders  in  the  thirteenth.  In  1522  was  seen  the  reform  of 
the  Camaldules;  in  1525  that  of  the  Franciscans,  which  gave 
birth  to  the  Capuchins;  toward  1530,  the  creation  of  the 
Barnabite  order,  which  had  been  preceded  six  years  before  by 
that  of  the  Theatins  by  Caraffa,  afterward  Pope  Paul  IV. 
The  members  of  this  last  order  made  a  vow  of  chastity, 
obedience,  and  poverty;  but  they  did  not  beg,  and  waited 
for  alms,  not  going  to  seek  them,  something  which  had  given 
rise  to  grave  abuses;  and  they  came  in  contact  with  active 
life  and  society  by  preaching,  ministration  of  the  sacrament, 
and  visits  to  the  sick  and  to  prisoners.  This  new  order 
quickly  drew  attention  by  the  virtues  of  its  members,  and  in 
its  ranks  were  recruited  the  upper  clergy  of  Italy. 

But  most  conspicuous  of  all  was  the  order  of  the  Jesuits. 
This  great  society  has  spread  everywhere,  and  everywhere  it 
has  had  enemies.  The  world  has  exhausted  itself  in  saying 
of  it  good  and  bad.  Its  founder,  Ignatius  de  Loyola,  a  Bis- 
cayan  gentleman  of  romantic  mind,  passed  through  asceticism 
to  reach  one  of  the  strongest  political  conceptions  the  world 
has  known.  He  had  the  idea  of  adding  to  the  three  ordinary 
vows  a  fourth  special  vow  of  obedience  to  the  Pope.  Thus 
against  Protestantism,  which  planted  itself  upon  free  exami- 
nation, and  which  disposed  the  mind  toward  revolt,  Ignatius 
de  Loyola  appealed  to  absolute  submission.  The  Reforma- 
tion, whether  it  wished  it  or  not,  when  it  was  not  taken  pos- 
session of  by  the  princes,  established  liberty.  The  Jesuits 
counterbalanced  this  tendency  by  throwing  themselves  toward 
the  opposite  extreme:"*  they  labored  to  restore  authority. 
The  other  orders  separated  themselves  from  the  world  to  live 
in  silence  and  prayer,  in  the  shade  and  solitude  of  the  clois- 
ter; the  Jesuits  exempted  themselves  from  the  external  acts 
of  devotion  which,  performed  at  the  choir  in  common  in 
the  monasteries  of  the  other  orders,  consumed  so  large  an 
amount  of  time;  they  were  unwilling  to  bind  themselves  to 
the  wearing  of  a  monkish  dress:  they  used  only  the  ordinary 
ecclesiastical  attire,  and  often  they  laid  even  this  aside  to  as- 
sume that  of  merchants  in  India,  and  in  China  that  of  the 
mandarins;  they  made  vows  of  poverty,  but  for  the  indi- 


CHAP.  XIV.]  THE   COUNCIL   OF   TRENT.  193 

vidual  only,  not  for  the  corporation,  thus  permitting  acquisi- 
tions for  the  latter.  Politics,  science,  literature,  they  neg- 
lected no  means  of  influence,  no  source  of  power,  giving  up 
all  to  religion  and  to  the  authority  of  the  sovereign  pontiff. 
Confessors  of  princes  in  Europe  and  apostles  of  the  faith  in 
India  and  America,  they  had  their  learned  men,  diplomats, 
and  martyrs;  they  possessed  also  able  teachers,  for  one  of 
their  principal  ends  was  to  acquire  the  right  of  training 
youth,  and  of  this  mission  they  showed  themselves  worthy 
by  their  learning  and  virtues. 

We  are  speaking  here  of  the  early  days  of  the  Jesuit  order, 
of  its  heroic  age,  when  its  members  had  only  the  ambition 
of  a  legitimate  influence  with  the  talents  and  virtues  con- 
ducting to  it.  But  when  they  had  entered  into  uncontested 
possession  and  enjoyment,  then  the  institution  deviated  in  its 
conduct  from  the  austere  rules  established  by  its  founder. 
They  labored  less  for  the  Church  than  for  the  corporation; 
they  no  longer  confounded  the  interests  of  the  Holy  See 
and  those  of  the  order.  To  the  austerity  of  a  pure  life,  they 
substituted  a  suppleness  of  principles  more  fit  for  gaining 
partisans  than  for  making  genuine  Christians.  After  having 
with  reason  fought  against  the  Protestant  doctrine  of  justifi- 
cation by  grace,  while  making  large  account  of  free  will,  they 
ended  by  representing  almost  every  act  as  excusable,  and 
thereby  rendered  morality  useless;  after  having  sustained  in 
politics  the  sovereignty  of  the  people  even  to  teaching  that  it 
is  permitted  to  kill  a  tyrant,  they  threw  themselves  violently 
upon  the  other  side.  But  we  are  discussing  an  epoch  far 
from  the  time  when  the  confessors  became  courtiers,  and 
when  a  fesv  of  the  successors  of  the  heroic  St.  Francis  Xavier 
transformed  their  missions  into  commercial  enterprises. 

The  organization  of  the  Society  of  Jesus  was  admirably 
devised.  First,  its  general  was  chosen  for  life  that  the  same 
direction  might  always  preside  over  the  government  of  the 
society.  Below  him  were  the  professed  friars,  who  had  made 
vows  of  chastity,  poverty,  and  absolute  obedience,  and  who 
had  charge  of  missions  wherever  they  were  necessary,  in  the 
midst  of  heretics  as  well  as  in  the  midst  of  barbarians.  Next 
came  the  spiritual  coadjutors,  clothed  with  priestly  char- 
acter, but  devoted  especially  to  public  instruction.  While 
the  friars  ceaselessly  traversed  the  world  to  preach,  hear 
confessions,  and  make  converts,  the  coadjutors,  settled  in 
localities  with  the  schoolmen,  who  formed  the  third  and  last 


194  THE  CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.          [BOOK  IV. 

class,  there  gained  influence  and  controlled  the  education  of 
youth.  Till  then  this  education  had  remained  in  the  hands 
of  literary  persons  whose  secular  and  pagan  habits  had 
become  peculiarly  suspicious  since  the  Reformation.  The 
Jesuits  undertook  the  task  of  replacing  them,  and  they  suc- 
ceeded by  a  more  accurate  method  of  instruction,  and  by  a 
better  division  of  studies.  Moreover,  in  their  colleges  tui- 
tion was  gratuitous,  as  was  the  mass  in  their  churches. 
Finally,  that  no  case  should  arise  to  distract  the  coadjutors 
and  the  schoolmen  from  their  labors,  the  colleges  might 
possess  revenues,  whose  administration  was  confided  to  lay 
coadjutors. 

Severe  laws  secured  the  discipline  of  the  order  and  the 
maintenance  of  its  hierarchy.  Vows  could  only  be  pro- 
nounced at  thirty  years  of  age,  so  that  the  order  should  not 
be  exposed  to  dangerous  repentances  and  that  the  chiefs 
might  have  the  time  to  become  acquainted  during  a  long 
novitiate  with  the  peculiar  qualities  of  each  so  as  then  to 
decide  where  one  would  serve  best.  No  members,  said  their 
constitution,  could  receive  or  write  letters  without  their  being 
read  by  a  superior.  When  entering  the  society  the  novice 
was  to  make  a  general  confession  and  to  state  his  good  qual- 
ities as  well  as  his  defects.  The  superior  appointed  his  con- 
fessor and  reserved  to  himself  absolution  for  those  cases 
which  it  might  be  useful  for  him  to  know.  No  one  was  to 
desire  a  rank  above  his  own,  and  all  the  members  were  for- 
bidden to  seek  any  ecclesiastical  dignity.  If  the  lay  co- 
adjutor did  not  know  how  to  read  and  write  he  could  learn 
only  with  the  permission  of  his  superiors.  One  should  allow 
himself  to  be  governed  by  his  superiors  with  complete 
abnegation  and  blind  submission,  as  the  staff  which  serves 
according  to  the  will  of  him  who  carries  it.  The  most 
absolute  obedience  took  the  place  of  all  other  motives  of 
human  activity. 

The  new  order  made  the  most  rapid  progress.  In  1540 
the  Pope  had  conditionally  approved  its  creation;  in  1543  he 
had  approved  it  fully.  When  Ignatius  died  in  1556  the 
society  already  counted  14  provinces,  100  colleges,  1000 
members.  Spain  and  Italy  were  conquered;  Austria  and 
Bavaria  occupied;  France  and  the  Netherlands  entered 
upon;  and  hardy  missionaries  were  traversing  the  Levant, 
Brazil,  the  Indies,  Japan,  and  Ethiopia.  So  the  grateful 
Popes  granted  to  this  devoted  militia  all  the  privileges  of 


CHAP.  XIV.]  THE   COUNCIL   OF   TRENT.  195 

other  orders,  and,  moreover,  the  authority  to  confer  aca- 
demic degrees,  to  conduct  religious  services  in  all  the 
churches,  even  during  an  interdict  to  bestow  absolution  in 
the  cases  reserved  to  the  Holy  See;  in  fine,  to  be  free 
from  all  local  jurisdiction. 

Thus  in  the  bosom  of    the  Catholic  Church  they   were 

reforming  abuses,  were  animated  by  ardent  piety,  and  arming 

themselves  with  discipline  and  obedience  for 

I  he     Council         ,  1*111  T  i  i 

of  Trent  (1545-  the  great  doctrinal  battle.  In  order  to  draw 
its  unity  closer  the  Church  had  its  great  ecu- 
menical council.  Paul  III.  convoked  it  at  Trent.  It  had 
been  long  demanded  by  all  parties;  but  all  parties  feared  it 
equally,  because  none  of  them  was  sure  of  there  bringing 
about  the  triumph  of  its  personal  interests.  When  at  last 
it  met,  in  1545,  the  rupture  was  definite  and  the  Protestants 
were  unrepresented.  All  the  Catholic  powers  sent  to  Trent 
their  ambassadors  and  prelates.  The  council  was  subscribed 
to  by  4  legates,  n  cardinals,  25  archbishops,  168  bishops, 
39  representatives  of  absent  bishops,  and  7  generals  of  reli- 
gious orders.  Thus  by  the  number  as  well  as  by  the  talents 
and  renown  of  its  members  the  Council  of  Trent  was  not 
inferior  to  the  eighteen  ecumenical  councils  which  had 
preceded  it. 

From  the  first  sessions  the  pontifical  influence  had  pre- 
dominated. The  inquisitor  Caraffa  and  the  Jesuit  Lainez 
directed  the  debates  and  controlled  all  the  decisions.  So 
there  were  no  more  conciliatory  measures,  always  fruitless; 
no  more  concessions,  henceforth  dangerous.  The  Catholic 
doctrine  was  affirmed  with  inexorable  frankness,  and  the- 
ology was  delivered  from  the  mists  gathered  about  it  by  dia- 
lectics. The  declaration  was  made  that  the  interpretation 
of  the  Holy  Scriptures  belonged  only  to  the  Church.  All 
the  Protestant  doctrines  upon  grace  and  justification  were 
condemned,  and  the  seven  sacraments  were  pronounced  in- 
dispensable. To  more  energetically  establish  unity  by  ren- 
dering dissent  impossible  it  was  decided  that  there  should 
be  made  a  catechism  for  instruction  (the  Roman  Catechism), 
which  St.  Charles  Borromeo  was  charged  with  drawing  up, 
a  breviary  and  missal  for  church  service  and  for  theological 
studies,  and  a  new  edition  of  the  Vulgate,  which  Sixtus  V. 
and  Clement  VIII.  accomplished. 

Firm  and  united  in  everything  which  regarded  only  the 
faith,  the  fathers  of  the  council  were  divided  upon  certain 


196  THE   CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.          [BOOK  IV. 

questions  of  ecclesiastical  discipline.  Thus  the  prelates 
who  were  not  Italians,  and  as  such  especially  attached  to  the 
Pope,  persisted  in  wishing  a  formal  declaration  that  their 
institution  was  divine.  But  since  they  received  their  bull  of 
appointment  from  the  Pope,  how  could  they  have  been  estab- 
lished simply  by  divine  right?  If  the  council  formally  stated 
this  right  the  Pope  was  nothing  more  than  a  bishop  like 
them.  His  chair  was  the  first  in  the  Latin  Church,  but  not 
the  origin  of  the  other  chairs;  it  lost  its  authority;  and  this 
question,  which  seemed  at  first  purely  theological,  was  linked 
with  the  most  delicate  politics.  The  council,  transferred 
from  Trent  to  Bologna  in  1546  by  Paul  III.  and  restored  to 
Trent  in  1551  by  Julius  III.,  was  obliged  to  disperse  in  1552 
on  the  approach  of  the  Lutherans,  commanded  by  Maurice 
of  Saxony,  and  held  no  sessions  for  ten  years. 

This  long  interruption  must  be  specially  attributed  to  the 
political  embarrassments  in  which  the  Holy  See  was  involved 
after  the  assassination  of  Pietro  Ludovico  Farnese  in  1547  by 
an  agent  of  the  Spanish  governor  of  Milan.  Paul  III. 
wished  for  a  moment  to  break  with  the  emperor  and  throw 
himself  into  the  arms  of  France;  his  death  in  1549  and  the 
accession  of  the  pacific  Julius  III.  prevented  this  rupture. 
It  burst  out  under  Caraffa,  who  became  Pope  under  the  name 
of  Paul  IV.  in  1555.  This  energetic  Pope  wished  to  restore 
liberty  to  Italy:  "Whatever  be  the  sentiment  of  others,  I  wish 
to  save  my  country.  If  my  voice  is  not  heard  I  shall  at 
least  enjoy  the  consolation  of  having  raised  it  to  defend  so 
grand  a  cause.  I  think  one  day  it  will  be  said  that  an  Italian, 
an  old  man,  bending  over  the  tomb,  and  who  one  would 
have  thought  had  nothing  else  to  do  save  repose  and  weep 
over  his  faults,  had  his  soul  filled  with  this  glorious  design." 
He  meant,  however,  in  no  way  to  relax  his  severity  against 
the  heretics  nor  his  ardent  zeal  for  Catholic  reformation; 
but  the  struggle  in  which  he  dared  to  engage  against  Spain 
too  profoundly  divided  the  Catholic  powers  to  permit  the 
recall  of  the  council. 

When  the  sword  of  the  Duke  of  Alva  had  annihilated  the 
last  remains  of  Italian  independence,  the  Holy  See  regained 
largely  in  the  spiritual  domain  what  it  had  lost  in  the  tem- 
poral. In  the  last  sessions  of  the  Council  of  Trent,  which 
was  reopened  in  1562,  Pope  Pius  IV.  by  political  conces- 
sions made  to  Philip  II.  averted  the  religious  reforms  which 
it  seemed  disposed  to  wrest  from  him.  By  ceasing  to  assert 


CHAP.  XIV.]  THE   COUNCIL   OF   TRENT.  197 

his  rights  over  crowns  he  prevented  anything  more  being 
said  of  reforming  the  Church  in  its  chief.  The  council 
instead  of  raising  itself  above  him,  after  the  example  of  the 
fathers  of  Constance  and  Basel,  humbled  itself  before  his 
authority.  The  spiritual  power  of  the  Holy  See  was  con- 
firmed over  all  Catholicism.  The  Pope  remained  sole  judge 
of  changes  to  be  introduced  in  Church  discipline,  infallible 
in  matters  of  faith,  supreme  interpreter  of  canons,  uncon- 
tested  chief  of  bishops.  Rome  could  console  herself  for  the 
decisive  loss  of  part  of  Europe  when  she  saw  her  power 
developed  in  the  Catholic  nations  of  the  south,  who  reli- 
giously pressed  closer  around  her. 

The  ecclesiastical  reformation  was  accomplished  under 
Pope  Pius  V.  (1566-72).  The  inflexible  old  man  made  the 
majority  of  Italian  states  admit  the  Roman  Inquisition,  and 
watched  severely  over  faith  and  morals.  The  bishops  were 
compelled  to  reside  in  their  dioceses,  the  monks  in  their 
monasteries;  the  laity  were  forced  to  observe  the  ceremo- 
nies of  the  faith;  whoever  violated  Sunday  had  on  the  third 
offense  his  tongue  pierced  and  was  sent  to  the  galleys;  the 
physician  could  not  visit  three  times  a  sick  person  who  had 
not  confessed.  The  German  College  founded  by  the  Jesuits 
became  a  nursery  of  priests  for  Italy  and  Germany.  Finally, 
to  round  out  this  return  toward  the  times  of  great  pontifical 
activity,  Pius  V.  made  himself  the  chief  of  a  crusade  which 
was  terminated  by  the  glorious  victory  of  Lepanto. 

Gregory  XIII.  followed  in  the  spiritual  government  the 
vigorous  impulsion  which  had  been  given  by  Pius  V.  He 
deserved  the  thanks  of  all  nations  for  his  reform  of  the  Julian 
calendar*  (1582).  But  his  charity  knew  no  bounds  and 

*  The  solar  year  consists  of  3650!.  sh.  48m.  465.  (Le  Verrier).  The 
astronomers  of  Julius  Caesar  reckoned  it  36sd.  6h.,  thus  making  it  urn. 
145.  too  long.  They  established  a  civil  year  of  36sd.,  but  every  fourth 
year  added  a  supplementary  day  in  order  to  compensate  for  the  6h.  taken 
from  each  year.  Till  1582  the  Julian  calendar  was  followed.  By  that 
time  the  um.  145.  added  to  the  civil  year  had  formed  an  excess  of  iod., 
and  the  civil  year  was  that  much  later  than  the  solar  year.  To  make 
the  relation  exact  Gregory  XIII.  cut  off  those  iod.  and  decided  that 
October  5,  1582,  should  be  reckoned  October  15.  In  addition  he 
decreed  that  in  the  space  of  400  years  3  leap  years  should  be  omitted, 
and  that  this  omission  should  take  place  on  those  years  terminating  the 
century  the  number  of  which  was  not  divisible  by  400.  Thus  1600  was 
a  leap  year  ;  so  2000  would  be  ;  but  not  1700,  1800,  or  1900.  The  Gre- 
gorian reform  was  at  once  adopted  in  Catholic  countries,  but  later  in  those 
which  are  Protestant ;  in  England  no  earlier  than  1752.  Hence  arises 


198  THE   CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.          [BOOK  IV. 

fell  into  extravagance.  As  a  temporal  sovereign  he  lacked 
order  and  energy;  he  allowed  brigandage  to  organize  itself 
on  a  large  scale  in  the  Roman  states. 

Happily  he  had  as  successor  Sixtus  V.  (1585-90).  This 
former  swineherd,  supported  by  charity  in  a  monastery,  was 
sixty-four  years  old  when  he  was  raised  to  the  papacy. 
This  honor  seemed  to  renew  his  youth :  hence  the  legend 
that  at  the  moment  of  his  exaltation  he  threw  away  his 
crutches.  First  he  attacked  the  brigands,  put  a  price  on 
the  head  of  their  leaders,  and  held  their  relatives  responsi- 
ble. "As  long  as  I  live,"  said  he  on  the  very  day  of  his 
coronation,  "every  criminal  shall  suffer  capital  punishment," 
and  he  kept  his  word.  The  governors  and  judges  who 
showed  a  disposition  to  untimely  clemency  were  replaced  by 
others  more  severe;  the  cardinals  charged  with  executing 
his  edicts  in  the  provinces  punctually  followed  his  vigorous 
intentions;  and  at  Bologna  a  noble,  Count  Pepoli,  lost  his 
life  for  having  given  shelter  to  bandits.  At  the  news  of  any 
assassination  the  good  Gregory  XIII.  was  satisfied  by  rais- 
ing his  hands  to  Heaven  and  groaning;  Sixtus  V.  said,  "They 
can  call  me  ferocious  and  sanguinary,  but  I  have  seen  in 
Scripture  that  the  best  sacrifice  one  can  make  to  God  is  the 
punishment  of  crime  and  the  blasting  of  malefactors  and 
disturbers  of  the  public  peace."  "Yet,"  says  Duclos,  "I 
maintain  that  there  were  fewer  executions  in  his  reign  than 
there  had  formerly  been  murders  in  a  month."  By  this 
severity  a  race  of  assassins  and  robbers  disappeared  who 
were  so  strongly  established  that  men  treated  with  them  for 
the  assassination  or  mutilation  of  an  enemy,  or  for  the 
plunder  of  property,  and  who  after  having  committed  all 
possible  horrors  found  a  sure  asylum  in  the  palaces  of  car- 
dinals and  princes  from  the  prosecution  of  officers  of  justice. 
At  the  end  of  two  years  the  ambassadors  solemnly  congratu- 
lated him  upon  the  security  of  the  highways  in  the  pontifical 
dominions. 

The  finances  were  in  the  greatest  disorder.  The  reign 
preceding  that  of  Sixtus  V.  had  exhausted  the  revenues  of 
three  principalities.  To  re-establish  them  he  had  recourse 
to  an  economy  as  rigid  as  his  justice  and  to  the  establish- 

the  distinction  of  old  and  new  style,  difference  between  which  was  at 
first  10  days.  The  Russians  and  Christians  of  the  Eastern  churches  still 
retain  the  Julian  calendar  ;  hence  the  difference  between  them  and  us  is 
now  12  days.  The  day  we  call  January  I  they  call  December  20. 


CHAP.  XIV.]  THE   COUNCIL   OF   TRENT.  199 

ment  of  new  sumptuary  taxes.  He  could  thus  form  a  re- 
serve of  4,500,000  scudi  and  defray  the  expenses  of  useful 
works.  He  enlarged  Rome  and  adorned  it.  He  brought  to 
the  Quirinal  and  the  Capitoline  from  a  distance  of  22  miles 
the  "aqua  felice, "  which  supplies  27  fountains.  The  popu- 
lation rose  to  more  than  100,000  souls,  a  figure  which  it  had 
not  attained  for  centuries. 

He  had  the  architect  Fontana  erect  the  obelisk  of  Calig- 
ula, an  enterprise  in  which  Julius  III.  and  Paul  III.  had 
failed.  He  built  the  Vatican  library,  and  added  to  it  a  print- 
ing establishment  designed  to  make  in  many  different  lan- 
guages correct  and  exact  editions  of  Scripture,  the  Church 
fathers,  and  liturgic  works  which  had  been  corrupted  or 
altered  by  time,  human  negligence,  or  the  bad  faith  of  the 
publishers. 

As  spiritual  chief  of  Christianity  he  followed  the  austere 
traditions  of  his  predecessors,  and  published  an  infinite 
number  of  bulls  to  reform  the  discipline  of  the  religious 
orders.  He  also  fixed  the  number  of  the  cardinals  at  70, 
and  divided  them  into  three  classes,  6  bishops,  50  priests, 
and  14  deacons,  each  one  having  as  his  title  the  name  of  a 
church  in  Rome;  there  has  been  no  deviation  since  from 
this  arrangement. 

Because  discipline  was  in  fact  confirmed,  morals  purified, 
and  the  scandal  of  immense  riches  and  of  the  worldly  life  of 
the  bishops  restrained,  the  religious  spirit  was  reanimated. 
Asceticism  and  religious  enthusiasm  reappeared.  Again 
were  seen  wonders,  saints  and  martyrs,  the  latter  among  the 
apostles  sent  by  the  Propaganda  into  the  perilous  missions 
of  the  two  worlds.  The  reform  of  the  religious  orders  con- 
tinued: new  orders  were  founded,  whence  most  commonly 
was  excluded  the  formal  devotion  of  the  ancient  monks,  and 
where  long  psalmodies  and  brutal  macerations  were  replaced 
by  intellectual  labors,  by  heart  impulses,  above  all  by 
charity.  These  three  tendencies  are  admirably  represented: 
the  first  by  the  Benedictines  of  St.  Maure,  by  the  priests  of 
the  Oratory,  by  the  recluses  of  Port  Royal;  the  second  by 
St.  Theresa  and  St.  Francis  de  Sales;  the  third  by  St.  Jean 
de  Dieu  and  the  French  St.  Vincent  de  Paul. 

But  at  Trent  and  Rome  something  more  was  hoped  from 
this  restoration  of  Catholicism.  The  image  of  Gregory  VII. 
had  passed  before  the  eyes  of  his  successors,  and  the  regene- 
rated Church  had  of  necessity  resumed  the  ambition  of  her 


200  THE   CATHOLIC  RESTORATION. 

grand  pontiffs.  To  her  misfortune  this  reconstitution  of 
pontifical  monarchy  took  place  at  the  moment  when  the  other 
monarchies,  having  likewise  attained  absolute  power,  could 
not  humble  themselves  under  any  authority  whatsoever,  nor 
admit  that  a  foreign  prince  could  exert  direct  action  in  their 
states.  If  then  the  decisions  of  the  Council  of  Trent  in  mat- 
ters of  faith  were  accepted  by  the  Catholic  powers,  it  was  by 
no  means  the  same  with  its  decisions  in  matters  of  discipline. 
Poland  and  Portugal  alone,  at  the  two  extremities  of  Catho- 
lic Europe,  raised  no  objection  against  them.  But  the 
French  parliaments  rejected  them  as  contrary  to  the  liber- 
ties of  the  Gallican  Church,  so  that  the  Council  of  Trent  has 
never  been  formally  accepted  in  France.  The  empire  and 
Hungary  followed  this  example,  and  the  Germans  like  the 
French  maintained  the  doctrine  of  Constance  and  Basel, 
asserting  the  superiority  of  councils  to  the  Pope,  which 
Bossuet  and  all  the  Gallican  Church  proclaimed  in  1682. 
Philip  II.  himself  accepted  the  acts  of  Trent  only  with 
certain  restrictions:  the  government  of  Venice  restricted  di- 
rect communication  of  its  clergy  with  the  Holy  See,  and  little 
by  little  the  Catholic  sovereigns  appropriated  a  part  of  those 
prerogatives  which  the  Protestant  princes  had  seized  by 
force.  Against  these  rights  of  civil  authority  the  Church  has 
struggled  during  the  last  eighty  years  with  increasing  energy. 
Ultramontanism  has  reundertaken  in  the  nineteenth  century 
the  work  of  the  sixteenth:  it  is  too  late,  for  if  the  Church  is 
more  compact  it  is  less  forceful,  and  the  spirit  of  the  world 
has  entered  upon  other  paths. 


CHAPTER    XV. 
THE   RELIGIOUS  WARS    (1559-98). 


The  Catholic  Chiefs  and  the  Protestant  Chiefs. — Struggle  of  the  Two 
Religions  in  the  Netherlands  ;  Formation  of  the  Republic  of  the 
United  Provinces  (1566-1609). — Struggle  of  the  Two  Religions  in 
England  ;  Elizabeth  and  Mary  Stuart  ;  the  Great  Armada  (1559- 
88). — Religious  Wars  in  France  (1562-98). 


THE  restored  Church  could  now  combat  with  words;  she 
needed  an  arm  to  combat  also  with  the  sword. 

Uc  ^  a  ^t'6  distance  from  Madrid  in  a  fright- 
chiefs  and  the  ful  solitude  upon  the  slopes  of  the  Guadarrama, 
chiefestant  swept  by  winds  of  extreme  violence,  rises  an 

immense  monument  of  granite;  seventeen 
main  buildings  cut  each  other  at  right  angles  and  form 
twenty-two  courts:  the  whole  represents  an  overturned 
gridiron  in  memory  of  the  instrument  of  torture  which 
served  for  capital  punishment  to  St.  Lawrence.  The  door 
of  the  grand  entrance  of  this  somber  edifice,  where,  how- 
ever, the  court  came  every  year  to  spend  the  latter  part 
of  autumn,  opens  only  twice  for  princes,  at  their  birth  and 
death.  It  is  at  once  a  monastery  and  a  palace,  the  Versailles 
and  St.  Denis  of  Spain:  they  call  it  the  Escurial.  There 
in  this  sad  dwelling  lived  a  man  who  reigned  forty-two  years 
over  the  vastest  empire  of  the  world,  and  whom  Protestant 
writers  have  named  the  "demon  of  the  south."  In  Spain 
he  wore  four  crowns:  those  of  Castile,  Navarre,  Aragon,  and 
later  that  of  Portugal.  He  was  master  of  Sicily  and  Sardi- 
nia; of  Naples  and  Milan  in  Italy;  of  Roussillon,  Franche 
Comte,  Charolais,  Artois,  and  Flanders  in  France;  of  the 
Netherlands  at  the  mouths  of  the  Scheldt,  Meuse,  and  Rhine ; 
of  Tunis  and  Oran  on  the  northern  coast  of  Africa;  of  Cape 
Verd,  the  Canaries,  the  islands  of  Fernando  Po,  Annobon, 
and  St.  Helena,  that  is  to  say,  of  the  Atlantic ;  of  Mexico, 


202  THE    CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.          [ BOOK  IV. 

Peru,  and  Chili,  that  is  to  say,  of  America;  of  Cuba,  St. 
Domingo,  Martinique,  Guadeloupe,  and  Jamaica,  that  is  to 
say,  of  the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  Finally,  in  Oceanica  he  pos- 
sessed the  Philippines,  and  he  was  to  inherit  the  Portuguese 
colonies  upon  the  coasts  of  Africa,  India,  and  Oceanica. 
The  sun  did  not  set  upon  his  states,  and  they  were  wont  to 
say,  "When  Spain  moves,  the  world  trembles." 

To  defend  so  many  kingdoms  he  had  the  golden  harvests 
of  the  New  World,  of  which  Charles  V.  had  only  the  first 
fruits,  the  best  disciplined  troops,  the  most  skillful  generals 
of  Europe — Philibert  Emmanuel,  the  conqueror  of  St. 
Quentin;  the  Duke  of  Alva,  the  conqueror  of  Muhlburg; 
his  natural  brother  Don  Juan  of  Austria,  who  was  to  gain  the 
great  victory  of  Lepanto;  the  Duke  of  Parma,  the  most  skill- 
ful tactician  of  that  century.  In  his  ports  of  war  were  found 
one  hundred  ships  of  the  line,  in  his  ports  of  commerce  a 
thousand  merchantmen ;  in  all  his  states,  finally,  he  had  abso- 
lute power,  and  in  Spain  the  devotion  of  a  whole  people. 
"The  Spaniards  do  not  love  him,"  said  Contarini — "they 
adore  him;  and  they  would  fear  to  offend  God  himself  by 
transgressing  his  revered  commands."  To  all  these  forces 
we  must  add  that  which  Philip  II.  derived  from  himself. 

We  have  seen  him  after  the  abdication  of  his  father, 
Charles  V.,  pursue  against  France  a  first  war,  which  the  treaty 
of  Cateau-Cambresis  terminated  (1559).  He  had  then  re- 
turned to  Spain,  no  more  to  leave  it.  Henceforward  it 
was  from  the  recesses  of  his  cabinet  that  he  governed,  by 
the  eloquence  of  his  diplomats  that  he  negotiated,  by  the 
sword  of  his  generals  that  he  fought.  But  Philip  had  in  the 
highest  degree  a  passion  for  power,  great  persistency  in 
labor,  eyes  always  open  upon  the  world  from  Mexico  to  the 
extremity  of  Sicily  to  inspect  his  ministers  and  his  empire; 
finally,  he  knew  how  to  preserve  an  impassive  soul,  a  severe 
and  unmoved  bearing  in  the  midst  of  the  disappointments 
of  politics  and  the  excitement  of  passions.  When  he  learned 
that  his  invincible  fleet  was  annihilated,  he  simply  said,  "I 
did  not  send  it  to  fight  against  the  elements." 

But  what  was  this  man  to  do  who  already  commanded 
so  many  nations?  Charles  V.  had  dreamed  of  preponderance, 
if  not  of  universal  dominion,  and  had  died  in  the  struggle; 
the  son  undertook  the  idea  of  the  father  with  a  political  and 
religious  exaltation  that  the  conqueror  of  Pavia  had  not 
known.  In  the  eyes  of  Philip  II.  the  Protestants  were  ene- 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  2O3 

mies  not  only  of  the  altar  but  of  the  throne.  Thus  he  made 
himself  the  champion  of  Catholicism  as  much  by  policy  as  by 
conviction;  for  he  well  understood  that  the  Church  with  its 
unity  and  rigid  discipline  was  the  firmest  support  of  absolute 
crowns,  and  he  destroyed  the  Reformers  not  only  in  his  states, 
where  he  stifled  even  the  least  germs  of  heresy,  but  through- 
out the  earth.  As  he  hated  Protestantism  as  much  as  he 
feared  it,  he  recoiled  before  no  means  of  crushing  this  hos- 
tile principle.  This  was  the  thought  of  his  entire  life.  To 
it  he  consecrated  rare  talents;  for  it  he  expended  all  his  mili- 
tary forces,  all  his  gold,  which  he  threw  away  by  handfuls  to 
subsidize  in  Holland  assassination,  in  England  conspiracies, 
in  France  civil  war.  The  world  knows  with  what  success 
and  also  with  what  results. 

When  the  two  kings  of  France  and  Spain  had  signed  so 
speedily  the  peace  of  Cateau-Cambresis,  it  was  to  carry  into 
the  government  the  new  spirit  which  animated  the  Church 
and  to  wage  against  heresy  a  pitiless  combat.  The  one  took 
upon  himself  to  smother  it  in  France,  the  other  to  hinder  its 
birth  in  Italy  and  Spain,  then  to  crush  it  out  in  the  Nether- 
lands and  England.  Henry  II.  dead,  his  sons,  the  last 
Valois,  continued  his  design,  and  at  first  had  need  only  of  the 
counsels  of  Spain. 

The  first,  Francis  II.,  reigned  less  then  a  year  and  a  half 
(1559-60);  the  second,  Charles  IX.,  was  twenty-four  years 
old  when  he  died  (1574);  the  third,  who  alone  reached 
mature  age,  remained  always  as  to  certain  sides  of  his  char- 
acter in  a  sort  of  minority  or  tutelage  whence  he  issued  only 
by  furious  transports  of  anger.  This  line  of  the  Valois  was 
therefore  incapable  of  controlling  the  great  battle  of  creeds  in 
France;  but  at  its  side  were  found  other  minds  powerful  and 
keen,  but  unfortunately  more  ready  for  evil  than  for  good. 

First  was  their  mother,  the  Italian  Catherine  de  Medici, 
of  a  mind  without  conviction,  of  a  character  without  scruple, 
who  wished  to  have  under  her  sons  a  power  she  had  not 
possessed  under  her  husband,  and  who  never  endeavored  to 
govern  save  by  influencing  men  through  their  vices  and  bad 
passions.  Two  families  disputed  with  her  this  power:  the 
one  foreign,  that  of  the  Guises ;  the  other  most  national, 
that  of  the  Bourbons,  whom  their  birth  brought  near  the 
throne,  but  who  were  separated  from  it  by  the  recollection 
of  the  Constable's  treason. 

Younger  members  of  the  house  of  the  Duke  of  Lorraine, 


204  THE  CA  THOLIC  RESTORA  TION.          [BOOK  IV. 

the  Guises  had  come  into  France  very  poor  and  had  there 
risen  rapidly  by  their  services.  They  had  early  formed  in- 
timate relations  with  Rome  and  were  actuated  by  a  high 
ambition.  They  declared  themselves  heirs  of  the  house  of 
Anjou,  and  had  claimed  the  crown  of  Naples,  which  had 
drawn  closer  their  connections  with  the  Holy  See.  Their 
niece,  Mary  Stuart,  was  Queen  of  Scotland;  they  made  her 
Queen  of  France  by  espousing  her  to  Francis  II.  At  the 
court  they  asserted  their  right  to  the  title  and  honors  of  for- 
eign princes;  they  displeased  the  nobility  by  claiming  preced- 
ence, and  discontented  the  first  prince  of  the  blood,  the  chief 
of  the  house  of  Bourbon,  by  causing  the  king,  now  become 
their  nephew,  to  intrust  to  them  all  the  administration  of 
the  country.  Men  of  ambition  much  more  than  of  faith, 
they  organized  the  Catholics  into  a  party  when  they  saw  the 
Protestants  form  a  faction  around  the  Bourbons  their  rivals; 
so  that  the  religious  wars  were  in  France,  at  least  for  the 
majority  of  leaders,  a  struggle  of  politics  as  much  as  of  creeds, 
and  in  certain  respects  the  last  great  battle  of  feudalism 
against  triumphant  royal  authority.  To  sustain  it  the  Guises 
naturally  drew  still  nearer  Rome,  and  after  having  for  a  long 
time  taken  the  advice  of  Philip  II.  took  his  gold,  his  sol- 
diers, and  were  on  the  point  of  placing  France  at  his  feet. 

Confronting  these  defenders  of  Catholicism  the  Protes- 
tant chiefs  were  Conde,  of  the  house  of  Bourbon,  the  Prince 
of  Orange,  or  the  Taciturn,  and  Elizabeth  of  England,  who 
probably  reached  the  same  religious  convictions  only  through 
political  interest;  finally,  Coligny,  a.  man  who  from  a  moral 
point  of  view  is  superior  to  all  the  rest.  As  to  Henry  of 
Navarre,  he  was  still  only  a  child. 

These  are  the  actors:  let  us  gaze  at  the  drama  which  is 
unfolding  on  three  principal  stages — in  France,  England, 
and  the  Netherlands.  The  spectacle  seems  to  lack  unity 
through  this  diversity  of  theaters,  which  have  each  their 
independent  action,  and  also  through  the  diversity  of  the 
interests  engaged.  The  seven  provinces  of  the  Netherlands 
wished  to  have  their  ancient  liberties  respected,  and  England 
its  independence.  In  France  the  contest  goes  even  farther, 
and  at  the  crisis  of  the  struggle  ends  by  becoming  a  ques- 
tion of  government  and  social  order:  it  is  that  the  Middle 
Ages  seek  to  return  with  their  privileges  of  cities,  castles, 
and  provinces.  But  every  century  prints  its  own  peculiar 
character  upon  affairs,  because  there  are  moral  epidemics 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  205 

just  as  there  are  physical,  and  quite  as  contagious.  In  the 
second  half  of  the  sixteenth  century  every  question  takes  on 
a  religious  form,  and  looking  upon  Europe  from  the  height 
of  the  Vatican  or  the  Escurial  we  shall  see  a  like  end  pur- 
sued: the  triumph  of  the  Church  as  it  had  just  been  consti- 
tuted by  the  Council  of  Trent,  and  the  domination  or  pre- 
ponderance of  Philip,  its  military  chief. 

It  would  be  interesting  to  follow  this  grand  drama  in  its 
entirety: 

To  the  declaration  of  war  made  by  the  kings  of  France 
and  Spain  against  heresy  as  early  as  1559  answer  the  Acts  of 
Parliament  which  establish  Elizabeth  as  supreme  chief  of  the 
Anglican  Church  (1559),  the  conspiracy  of  Amboise  (1560), 
the  secularization  of  all  the  bishoprics  of  Brandenburg,  and 
the  suppression  of  the  religious  and  military  order  of  Livonia. 

The  death  of  Francis  II.  (1560)  suspends  the  crisis  in 
France;  but  it  breaks  out  with  the  massacre  of  Vassy(i562). 
Elizabeth  gives  succor  to  the  Reform  party  in  France;  the 
death  of  the  Duke  of  Guise  before  Orleans  arrests  the  war, 
which  Philip  II.  and  Catherine  de  Medici  secretly  continue. 

In  1564  the  Pope  confirms  by  a  bull  the  decrees  of  the 
Council  of  Trent,  and  the  following  year  the  conferences  of 
Bayonne  mark  the  good  understanding  of  the  governments 
of  France  and  Spain  for  the  extirpation  of  heresy. 

Persecution  redoubling,  the  fire  bursts  forth  in  the  Nether- 
lands and  reaches  France:  compromise  of  Breda  (1564); 
second  and  third  wars  of  religion  (1567  and  1568). 

In  1568  Philip  II.  drives  his  son  to  suicide,  his  wife  to 
death,  and  the  Moors  to  revolt.  He  establishes  the  Inquisi- 
tion in  the  Spanish  colonies,  and  has  Egmont  and  Horn  be- 
headed in  the  Netherlands.  But  in  Scotland  the  errors  and 
the  fall  of  Mary  Stuart  assure  the  victory  to  the  Reformers. 

As  the  forces  of  Spain  are  employed  in  Andalusia  against 
the  Moors,  on  the  Mediterranean  against  the  Ottomans,  in 
the  Netherlands  against  the  "Beggars,"  she  possesses  for 
France  and  England  only  the  resource  of  conspiracies.  The 
victory  of  Lepanto  (1571)  encourages  them,  and  Norfolk 
endeavors  to  overthrow  Elizabeth  for  the  profit  of  Mary 
Stuart;  Catherine  de  Medici  endeavors  to  end  with  the  Cal- 
vinist  party  by  the  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew.  Catholi- 
cism triumphs! 

But  mutilated  and  bloody,  Protestantism  arises  again 
stronger  than  before;  the  Belgians  unite  with  the  Batavians 


206  THE   CA  THOLIC  RESTORA  TION.         [BOOK  IV. 

(1576)  and  Elizabeth  takes  them  under  her  protection  (1578). 
The  Ottomans  themselves  drive  out  the  Spaniards  from 
Tunis  (1574).  The  acquisition  of  Portugal  is  by  no  means 
an  increase  of  force  to  Philip  II.,  since  he  employs  this 
advantage  poorly  (1580),  and  the  assassination  of  the  Silent 
exasperates  the  Dutch  and  all  Protestant  peoples  instead 
of  depressing  them.  The  English  ravage  with  impunity 
the  Spanish  colonies,  the  Dutch  those  of  Portugal.  In  1585 
the  Duke  of  Anjou  dies,  the  King  of  Navarre  becomes  the 
heir  of  the  French  crown,  and  the  following  year  Elizabeth 
begins  the  trial  of  Mary  Stuart,  whose  head  falls  some  months 
later  upon  the  scaffold.  Everywhere  Protestantism  becomes 
menacing.  A  supreme  effort  is  needed:  the  Guises  treat  with 
Philip  II.  (1586),  the  league  makes  ready  to  open  France 
to  his  armies,  all  the  states  of  the  Catholic  king  exhaust 
themselves  in  giving  him  the  fleet  and  army  which  shall  bring 
back  the  Netherlands  and  England,  and  then  France,  under 
the  Catholic  faith  and  the  law  of  Spain. 

But  the  Invincible  Armada  is  destroyed  (1588),  the  Guises 
are  assassinated  (1589),  the  league  conquered  (1593). 
Elizabeth  and  Henry  IV.  triumph.  The  edict  of  Nantes 
and  the  peace  of  Vervins  are  signed  three  weeks  apart,  and 
Philip  II.  dies  four  months  later  (1598).  The  independence 
of  Europe  is  saved,  toleration  has  gained  its  first  victory, 
and  intellectual  liberty  begins.  A  new  state,  the  United 
Provinces,  seats  itself  among  the  nations ;  an  ancient  state, 
England,  has  the  revelation  of  its  future  power;  and 
France  is  placed  by  a  great  prince  at  the  head  of  Europe. 
But  so  powerful  had  been  the  opposing  effort  that  Spain 
remained  as  if  broken  for  more  than  200  years. 

Such  is  the  general  outline  of  this  great  picture;  to  paint 
it  there  is  needed  a  canvas  larger  than  I  can  control  here, 
and  I  am  reduced  to  present  successively  these  three  his- 
tories which  it  would  have  been  better  to  portray  together. 

The  Netherlands  were  in  the  sixteeenth  century  the  richest 

country  of  Europe;  in  the  single  year  1566  they  had  received 

from  Lisbon,  Italy,  and  England  80,000,000 

two'reWgtons^n   francs'  worth  of  commodities.     Bruges  alone 

the  Netherlands:  hacj    bought  nearly   io.ooo.ooo  francs'  worth 

formation         of  .  °  ,    '    .  .  -jj-j 

the   republic  of  of  Spanish  wool.     Antwerp  it  was  said  did 
ir^S^-Sr   more  business  in  a  month  than  Venice  in  two 
years.     In  1566  she  had  a  thousand  commer- 
cial houses.     Every  day  300  ships  entered  her  harbor,  and 


CHAP.  XV.J         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  207 

every  week  2000  wagons  reached  her  from  Germany,  France, 
or  Lorraine.  Lille,  Courtai,  Valenciennes,  Douai,  Brussels, 
were  almost  equally  active.  "Flanders,"  says  a  Spanish 
writer,  "seemed  then  to  make  only  a  single  city,  prosperous 
communities  so  pressed  upon  each  other."  ("Flandriam 
continuam  urbem.")  It  is  not  surprising,  if  the  taxes  of 
the  Netherlands  brought  in  more  than  those  of  Castile,  that 
Philip  II.  could  derive  from  this  country  as  much  as 
35,000,000  francs  in  1588. 

Charles  V.,  his  father,  had  cruelly  persecuted  the  Reform 
party  in  the  Netherlands — they  speak  of  50,000  victims; 
but  Fleming  in  heart  as  well  as  by  birth,  his  adminis- 
tration, save  as  concerned  with  heresy,  had  in  general 
been  benevolent  and  able.  He  had  favored  the  commerce 
of  the  Flemings  by  opening  outlets  for  it;  he  loved  them  as 
his  compatriots,  surrounded  himself  with  them,  and  intrusted 
to  them  the  principal  offices  of  his  empire.  Everything 
changed  under  Philip  II.  The  Flemish  nobility  lost  its 
credit  at  court  to  the  profit  of  Spanish  grandeeship.  Men 
accustomed  to  the  splendor  of  great  affairs,  to  the  movement 
of  war  and  politics,  saw  themselves  condemned  to  inaction. 

The  people  were  not  better  treated.  They  had  lent  their 
ears  to  the  sermons  of  Reformers  which  re-echoed  around 
them.  Philip  II.  to  arrest  the  progress  of  heresy  created 
four  new  bishoprics  in  the  Netherlands,  which  he  endowed 
at  the  expense  of  the  abbeys  of  the  country ;  he  introduced 
the  decrees  of  the  Council  of  Trent,  and  to  secure  the  execu- 
tion of  these  measures  he  garrisoned  the  principal  cities  with 
Spanish  troops  and  conferred  on  foreigners  the  principal 
offices.  It  seemed  like  a  Spanish  invasion  of  the  Nether- 
lands. This  little  country,  which  asked  only  freedom  to 
manufacture  and  sell,  saw  itself  chained  to  a  monarchy 
which  exhausted  its  resources  in  impossible  projects,  which 
each  day  demanded  more,  and  which  each  day  gave  less 
repose  and  security. 

Attacked  in  their  national  self-love,  menaced  in  their 
religious  as  well  as  in  their  political  liberties,  the  Nether- 
landers,  nobles  and  burgesses,  great  and  small,  Catholics  and 
Reformers,  made  complaint.  The  opposition  was  especially 
keen  against  Cardinal  Granvelle,  who  was  intrusted  with  the 
establishment  in  the  Netherlands  of  absolute  power  and 
religious  unity.  The  governor,  Margaret  of  Parma,  endeav- 
ored to  banish  public  discontent  by  concessions.  The 


208  THE   CA  THOLIC  RESTORA  TION.          [BOOK  IV. 

Spanish  troops  were  recalled,  Granvelle  was  removed,  but 
the  edicts  which  he  had  promulgated  remained ;  and  the 
nobility,  giving  in  1566  the  example  of  resistance,  signed  the 
compromise  of  Breda  by  which  the  majority  of  the  Flemish 
gentlemen  promised  each  other  mutual  assistance.  They 
then  demanded  of  the  governor  the  redress  of  their  griev- 
ances. 

Margaret  replied  that  she  would  support  their  demands 
before  the  king.  Philip  II.  himself  had  appeared  disposed 
to  modify  his  severity;  he  had  at  least  given  such  assurance 
to  the  Count  of  Egmont.  A  compromise  was  still  possible. 
But  the  people,  less  patient  than  the  nobility,  rushed  to  arms, 
everywhere  broke  the  images  of  the  saints,  overturned  the 
altars,  burned  the  pulpits,  and  showed  in  their  retaliation  as 
much  violence  as  their  enemies  had  shown  cruelty  in  perse- 
cution. The  terrified  nobles  rallied  around  the  governor; 
the  insurrection,  isolated  by  its  very  excesses,  was  every- 
where conquered. 

Clemency  could  have  rendered  this  victory  fruitful.  But 
in  these  troubles  Philip  II.  saw  only  the  justification  of  his 
preceding  measures.  He  wrote  to  the  Pope  "that  he  would 
lose  the  provinces  or  would  maintain  there  the  Catholic 
religion";  he  sent  into  the  Netherlands  his  best  army  and 
the  Duke  of  Alva,  his  best  general  (1567).  No  one  was 
more  capable  of  understanding  and  executing  the  intentions 
of  Philip  II.  Cruel  by  system  and  not  by  passion,  thereby 
keeping  his  conscience  quiet,  he  looked  upon  force  as  the 
only  means  of  government.  An  exceptional  tribunal,  com- 
posed of  foreigners,  and  which  received  the  too  well  merited 
name  of  "blood  tribunal,"  entered  at  once  upon  its  functions. 
Eighteen  thousand  persons  were  executed,  among  them  the 
counts  of  Horn  and  Egmont,  30,000  despoiled  of  their 
goods;  100,000  quitted  the  country.  The  Duke  of  Alva 
had  himself  represented  upon  the  public  square  of  Antwerp 
trampling  upon  the  prostrate  Flemings.  To  better  hold 
them  in  dependence  he  proposed  to  ruin  them  by  subjecting 
them  to  a  disastrous  tax  of  one-tenth  upon  the  price  of 
merchandise  sold.  This  tax  was  levied  in  such  fashion 
that  it  absorbed  seven-tenths  of  the  value  of  certain  mer- 
chandises— of  cloth,  for  example.  It  was  the  destruction 
of  Flemish  manufactures.  The  burgesses  of  Brussels  rose 
in  insurrection.  Seventeen  were  about  to  be  hung  when 
arrived  the  news  of  the  capture  of  Briel  by  the  "Beggars." 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  209 

When  the  200  deputies  had  come  to  ask  of  Margaret  of 
Parma  redress  of  grievances,  a  lord  to  reassure  the  governor, 
who  showed  herself  greatly  terrified,  had  said  to  her,  "They 
are  only  beggars."  The  rebels  received  this  contemp- 
tuous name  as  an  honor,  and  assumed  it  to  indicate  their 
party.  The  barbarous  rigor  of  the  Duke  of  Alvagave  them 
numerous  recruits.  After  having  long  carried  on  a  piratical 
war,  which  accomplished  nothing,  they  undertook  war  on 
land,  which  might  effect  something;  they  made  themselves 
masters  of  Briel,  and  forthwith  Holland  and  Zealand  took 
arms  (1572). 

This  was  the  signal  of  a  struggle  lasting  thirty-seven  years, 
at  the  end  of  which  the  northern  provinces  established  them- 
selves as  a  republic.  At  the  beginning  of  the  war  the  insur- 
gents asked  only  religious  liberty.  Without  doubt,  having 
to  struggle  against  an  enemy  so  formidable  as  the  King  of 
Spain,  they  would  have  succumbed  despite  their  heroic 
courage  if  they  had  remained  without  support;  but  they 
were  sustained  by  the  Protestants  of  Germany,  England,  and 
France ;  moreover,  they  were  aided  by  the  nature  of  their 
country,  cut  up  with  canals,  and  by  the  ambition  even  of 
Philip  II.,  who  pursued  too  many  great  affairs  at  once  to  be 
able  to  bring  a  single  one  to  a  satisfactory  conclusion. 

Especially  they  had  the  good  fortune  to  find  as  chief 
William  of  Nassau,  Prince  of  Orange.  Great  in  reverses 
like  Coligny,  whose  daughter  he  espoused,  none  knew  better 
how  to  profit  by  the  least  success.  He  concentrated  in  his 
hands  all  the  operations  of  war  and  politics,  and  made  a 
powerful  state  of  a  few  small  revolted  cities.  The  saying  of 
Granvelle  is  well  known  when  it  was  announced  to  him  that 
the  Duke  of  Alva  had  destroyed  the  army  of  the  Prince  of 
Orange:  "Was  the  Silent  captured?"  "No."  "Well,  the 
duke  has  done  nothing." 

Violence  having  failed,  Philip  replaced  Alva  by  Don  Luis 
de  Requesens  (1573).  This  new  governor  was  unable  to  cap- 
ture Leyden,  which  liberated  Holland,  nor  to  save  Middle- 
burg,  which  made  him  lose  Zealand.  After  his  death  the 
army,  left  three  years  without  pay  and  food,  took  care  of 
itself  by  sacking  the  principal  cities,  among  others  Maest- 
richt  and  Antwerp.  As  a  result  the  Catholics  united  with  the 
Protestants,  the  Walloon  provinces  with  the  Batavian  prov- 
inces, and  the  Confederation  of  Ghent  was  concluded  (1576). 

Philip  II.  then  sent  into  the  Netherlands  the  conqueror 


210  THE   C A  7^ HO LIC  RESTORATION.          [BOOK  IV. 

of  Lepanto,  Don  Juan  of  Austria,  who  endeavored  to  make 
them  believe  in  his  moderation  and  his  desire  for  peace. 
He  was  foiled  by  the  distrust  of  the  Protestants.  He  suc- 
ceeded at  least  in  introducing  germs  of  discord  between  the 
Batavians  and  the  Walloons.  The  latter,  distrusting  the 
Calvinist  William  of  Orange,  in  1577  invited  to  direct  the 
war  against  Spain  the  Catholic  Mathias,  Archduke  of  Austria, 
then  the  Duke  of  Anjou,  brother  of  Henry  III.  of  France 
(1578).  Don  Juan  died  at  the  age  of  thirty-one;  his  suc- 
cessor, the  Duke  of  Parma,  Alexander  Farnese,  profited  by 
these  divisions:  skillfully  mingling  diplomacy  and  war,  he 
succeeded  in  breaking  the  Union  of  Ghent ;  the  ten  Walloon 
provinces  being  manufacturing  and  Catholic,  the  seven  Bata- 
vian  provinces  being  commercial  and  Calvinist,  the  opposi- 
tion of  interest  and  creed  brought  about  opposition  of 
political  views.  The  Walloons  recognized  Philip  II.  as  king 
by  the  treaty  of  Maestricht  (1579).  But  already  the  seven 
northern  provinces  (Holland,  Zealand,  Guelderland,  Utrecht, 
Friesland,  Overyssel,  and  Groningen)  had  drawn  their  union 
closer  at  Utrecht  and  had  constituted  themselves  a  federal 
republic,  each  preserving  its  distinct  administration,  but  all 
subjected  to  the  assembly  of  the  States  General,  and  having  a 
stallholder,  or  governor  general,  who  was  William  of  Orange 
(January  23,  1579).  Two  years  later  the  States  General  of 
The  Hague,  the  federal  capital  of  the  United  Provinces, sepa- 
rated solemnly  from  the  crown  of  Spain,  broke  the  seal  of 
Philip  II.,  and  declared  him  deprived  of  all  authority  in  the 
Netherlands.  This  declaration  was  the  fundamental  title  of 
the  new  republic  (1581). 

The  definitive  result  of  the  war  was  attained.  With  all 
his  genius  and  despite  the  assassination  of  the  Prince  of 
Orange  by  an  agent  of  Spain  (1584)  Farnese  could  not  reduce 
the  northern  provinces.  Those  of  the  south  (Brabant, 
Limburg,  Luxemburg,  Flanders,  Artois,  Hainault,  Namur, 
Zutphen,  Antwerp,  and  Malines)  attempted  for  a  moment 
to  make  themselves  an  independent  state  under  the  Duke 
of  Anjou  (1581);  but  this  prince  committed  only  faults  and 
quitted  the  Netherlands  in  shame.  Leicester,  whom  Eliza- 
beth sent  to  sustain  them,  had  no  better  success  (1585). 
The  queen  best  succored  the  republic  by  destroying  the  In- 
vincible Armada  (1588).  Exhausted  by  this  great  effort, 
distracted  by  the  affairs  of  France,  where  he  several  times 
sent  Farnese  and  the  successors  of  that  skillful  general, 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  211 

Philip  II.  seemed  to  renounce  the  Netherlands  by  giving 
them  as  dowry  to  his  daughter  Isabella,  who  was  to  espouse 
an  Austrian  archduke  (1598).  In  1609  Philip  II.  consented 
to  a  twelve  years'  truce  with  the  States  General  of  The  Hague. 
The  independence  of  the  republic  of  the  Seven  Provinces 
was  not,  however,  officially  recognized  by  Spain  till  the 
treaty  of  Westphalia  in  1648. 

In  Britain  the  struggle  of  Catholicism  and  the  Reforma- 
tion was  personified  in  two  women — Elizabeth   and    Mary 

Stuart. 

twoWgfonVto  Possessed  of  an  elevated  mind,  of  impe- 
Engiand;  Eliza-  rious  character,  of  extreme  haughtiness,  with 

beth  and    Mary  ,°  •     .    ,,.' 

stuart;  the  much  energy,  astuteness,  and  intelligence, 
?i55<H38jArmada  Elizabeth,  daughter  of  Anne  Boleyn,  had  been 
long  constrained  to  dissemble  her  sentiments 
and  her  faith  during  the  terrible  reign  of  her  sister,  who  for  a 
short  time  confined  her  in  the  Tower,  and  would  have  pro- 
scribed her  but  for  the  interested  support  lent  her  by  Philip 
II.  Mary  had  given  no  child  to  this  prince,  and  if  Elizabeth 
disappeared,  the  crown  of  England  reverted  to  the  young 
Scotch  queen  Mary  Stuart,  consequently  to  her  husband,  the 
dauphin,  who  became  King  Francis  II.  Philip  preferred  to 
run  the  risk  of  seeing  England  heretical  rather  than  closely 
united  to  France.  Elizabeth  had  therefore  lived  suspected 
and  watched  far  from  the  court,  "and  had  adopted  that 
habit  of  deceit  which  in  her  was  allied  with  the  haughty  and 
violent  passions  which  she  had  derived  from  her  father. 
The  day  of  her  accession  (November  17,  1558)  she  showed 
herself  as  she  was  all  the  rest  of  her  life.  She  took  posses- 
sion of  the  throne  with  ease,  and  passed  from  oppression  to 
command  without  surprise  or  embarrassment.  She  at  once 
surrounded  herself  with  devoted  and  able  men.  The  two 
chief  were  Lord  Robert  Dudley,  whom  she  named  Earl  of 
Leicester,  and  who  remained  her  favorite  as  long  as  he  lived, 
and  William  Cecil,  who  was  forty  years  her  prime  minister. 
Knowing  how  to  retain  those  whom  she  had  known  how  to 
choose,  she  was  always  well  served.  She  did  not  permit  her 
favorites  to  become  a  single  moment  her  masters,  and  her 
most  experienced  ministers  were  never  anything  more  than 
her  useful  instruments.  In  every  emergency  she  sought 
their  counsels  and  reserved  her  decisions.  Her  will,  only 
controlled  by  calculation  and  interest,  was  sometimes  slow, 
often  audacious,  always  sovereign." 


212  THE   CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.         [BOOK  IV. 

Philip  would  have  wished  to  renew  with  her,  or  rather  with 
England,  the  bonds  which  had  united  him  to  Mary  Tudor. 
He  made  her  the  offer  of  his  hand.  Elizabeth  was  very  care- 
ful not  to  give  herself  such  a  master.  When  she  had  openly 
declared  herself  Protestant  the  king  at  first  remonstrated 
with  her,  and  then  commenced  a  secret  war  of  under- 
hand practices  and  intrigues  which  preceded  by  twenty-five 
years  the  open  rupture.  In  1563  the  Spanish  ambassador 
distributed  60,000  crowns  to  the  Catholic  priests  per- 
secuted by  Elizabeth;  hence  the  queen  had  him  arrested  in 
his  palace  as  a  fomentor  of  plots,  while  her  minister,  Cecil, 
declared  in  full  Parliament  that  Philip  II.  was  about  to  order 
an  invasion.  He  was  in  fact  making  great  preparations  in 
the  harbors  of  the  Netherlands.  In  1564  privateering  com- 
menced between  the  two  nations;  Elizabeth  having  caused 
five  ships  to  be  seized  (1567)  which  carried  the  pay  of  the 
army  in  Flanders,  the  Duke  of  Alva  by  reprisal  captured  the 
goods  of  the  English  in  Flanders. 

Philip  counted  upon  a  powerful  diversion  at  the  very  heart 
of  Great  Britain;  he  offered  the  Queen  of  Scotland  gold, 
ships,  soldiers,  and  his  counsels. 

Niece  of  the  Guises,  educated  at  the  brilliant  court  of 
Henry  II.,  King  of  France,  the  Catholic  Mary  Stuart  after 
the  death  of  her  young  spouse,  Francis  II.,  found  herself 
thrown  at  eighteen  years  of  age  in  the  midst  of  a  savage  and 
fanatic  country.  Scotland,  of  which  she  became  the  nominal 
queen,  obeyed  much  more  the  fierce  John  Knox.  This  re- 
former had  had  Calvin  as  a  master,  whom  he  surpassed  per- 
haps in  energy.  Arrested  after  the  assassination  of  the 
primate  Beaton  (1546),  he  had  passed  many  years  chained 
in  the  galleys  of  France,  had  returned  to  Scotland  in  1555, 
and  by  his  eloquence,  the  purity  of  his  morals,  his  inde- 
fatigable ardor,  his  enthusiasm  skillfully  tempered  by  pru- 
dence, he  had  succeeded  in  introducing  the  Calvinist  doc- 
trines into  his  native  country.  As  early  as  the  year  1557 
the  Protestant  lords  had  united  by  a  public  covenant,  and, 
thanks  to  the  assistance  of  Elizabeth,  had  obtained  by  the 
treaty  of  Edinburgh  the  return  of  the  French  troops  and 
thereby  rendered  themselves  masters  of  the  government 
(1560).  The  death  of  the  regent,  Mary  of  Lorraine,  the  same 
year  precipitated  the  ruin  of  Catholicism  in  Scotland.  The 
confession  of  Knox  was  solemnly  adopted  by  Parliament 
(August  7,  1560).  The  ministers  of  the  new  Church  drew 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  213 

up  the  book  of  discipline  designed  to  regulate  the  Christian 
government  among  them.  They  disapproved  of  the  Anglican 
hierarchy  almost  as  much  as  of  the  Roman  hierarchy.  The 
religious  sovereignty  belonged  then  to  the  people,  who,  recog- 
nized as  the  source  of  ecclesiastical  authority,  alone  chose 
the  ministers.  The  kingdom  was  divided  into  ten  dioceses, 
at  the  head  of  which  were  to  be  placed  ten  ministers  invested 
with  the  title  of  superintendents.  A  school  was  founded  in 
every  parish,  "in  order  to  provide  for  the  virtuous  and  pious 
education  of  youth."  Scotland  found  itself  then  a  sort  of 
Protestant  republic  directed  by  lords  and  ministers  under 
the  protectorate  of  England. 

All  this  was  accomplished  before  the  young  and  brilliant 
widow  of  Francis  II.  had  returned  from  France.  Mary 
quitted  that  country  only  with  regret.  "The  galley  having 
issued  from  the  harbor  of  Calais  and  a  light  wind  arising,  they 
commenced  to  make  sail.  She,  her  two  arms  on  the  poop  of 
the  galley  beside  the  tiller,  began  to  melt  into  great  tears, 
always  turning  her  beautiful  eyes  toward  the  port  and  place 
whence  she  had  set  out,  pronouncing  always  these  sad  words, 
'Adieu,.  France!'  until  it  began  to  be  night.  She  wished  to 
go  to  bed  without  eating,  and  was  unwilling  to  go  down  to 
the  poop  cabin,  and  they  made  her  a  bed  on  deck.  She 
ordered  the  helmsman  as  soon  as  it  was  day,  if  he  could  still 
discern  the  land  of  France,  to  wake  her  and  not  fear  calling 
her;  in  which  fortune  favored  her;  for  the  wind  having 
ceased  and  they  having  recourse  to  oars,  little  progress  was 
made  that  night;  so  that  when  the  day  appeared  the  land  of 
France  was  still  seen,  and  the  helmsman  not  failing  to  obey 
the  commands  she  had  given  him,  she  arose  upon  her  bed  and 
began  to  contemplate  France  again  and  as  long  as  she  could. 
Then  she  kept  repeating  these  words,  'Adieu,  France!  adieu, 
France!  I  think  I  shall  never  see  thee  more*  '  (Bran- 
tome).  She  arrived  at  Edinburgh  August  21,  1561,  having 
escaped  the  English  cruisers  with  difficulty. 

However,  by  means  of  tact  and  gentleness,  she  won  the 
sympathies  of  the  nobles  and  the  affections  of  the  people, 
and  the  first  years  of  her  reign  passed  away  without  great 
difficulties  because  she  leaned  upon  her  natural  brother, 
Lord  James  Stuart,  whom  she  created  Earl  of  Murray.  But 
it  was  necessary  to  settle  the  succession  to  the  throne; 
Scotland,  which  had  so  many  times  suffered  from  the  min- 
ority of  its  sovereigns,  was  desirous  of  the  queen's  contract- 


214  THE    CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.          [BOOK  IV. 

ing  a  second  marriage.  Mary,  sought  after  by  a  crowd  of 
princes,  wished  to  make  no  choice  without  consulting  Eliza- 
beth, whose  heir  she  considered  herself,  for  the  Queen  of 
England  had  already  announced  the  intention  of  never  wed- 
ding a  husband  from  fear  of  giving  herself  a  master.  Eliza- 
beth, jealous  of  Mary  Stuart, whom  Europe  declared  the  most 
graceful  and  most  beautiful  woman  of  the  century,  showed 
so  much  ill  will  that  Mary  ended  by  no  longer  seeking  her 
advice.  She  espoused  her  cousin,  Henry  Darnley  (1565). 

This  fatal  marriage  was  the  beginning  of  her  faults  and 
misfortunes.  First,  it  embroiled  her  with  the  ambitious 
Murray;  moreover,  under  the  most  seductive  exterior 
Darnley  concealed  a  degraded  soul  and  the  grossest  tastes. 
He  loved  to  drink,  spent  most  of  his  time  at  the  chase,  and 
showed  himself  haughty,  harsh,  and  exacting.  Mary,  brought 
up  in  a  refined  and  elegant  court,  soon  looked  upon  him 
with  disgust.  We  know  the  tragic  events  which  followed. 
A  Piedmontese  musician,  the  favorite  of  the  queen,  was  mur- 
dered before  her  eyes.  She  forced  the  murderers  into  ex- 
ile, and  in  revenge  allowed  the  Earl  of  Bothwell  to  destroy 
Darnley.  The  unhappy  man  was  strangled  while  he  slept, 
and  the  house  blown  up  (1567). 

Three  months  after  Mary  Stuart  espoused  the  assassin. 
But  all  Protestant  Scotland  rose  in  revolt.  Bothwell  was 
obliged  to  flee,  became  a  pirate,  was  captured  and  confined 
at  Malmo  on  the  Sound,  where  he  died  in  1576.  Mary, 
taken  to  Edinburgh  in  the  midst  of  the  cries  and  insults  of 
the  populace,  was  conducted  to  the  castle  of  Lochleven. 
She  was  compelled  to  abdicate  in  favor  of  James  VI.,  her 
only  son,  and  to  recognize  Lord  Murray,  her  natural  brother, 
as  Regent  of  Scotland.  She  escaped,  thanks  to  the  devotion 
of  a  Douglas,  and  put  herself  at  the  head  of  the  army  which 
the  Seatons  and  the  Hamiltons  had  got  together.  But  these 
troops,  levied  in  haste,  were  routed  near  Langside.  Instead 
of  taking  refuge  in  France  Mary  determined  to  commit  her- 
self, despite  the  supplications  of  all  her  friends,  into  the 
hands  of  Elizabeth  (1568).  She  believed  in  England  she 
would  find  an  asylum;  she  found  there  a  prison.  In  order 
to  give  herself  the  right  of  treating  Mary  as  a  criminal 
Elizabeth  had  her  arraigned  before  a  tribunal  of  English 
lords  where  Murray  and  his  principal  adherents  were  present. 
After  five  months  of  inquiry  the  Queen  of  England  announced 
to  the  two  parties  that  on  one  side  she  had  discovered  noth- 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  215 

ing  that  could  bring  doubt  upon  the  honor  of  the  Earl  of 
Murray,  and  that  on  the  other  he  had  proved  none  of  the 
crimes  of  which  he  accused  his  sovereign.  In  consequence 
Murray  set  out  for  Scotland  charged  with  a  considerable 
sum  lent  him  by  Elizabeth,  and  Mary  was  retained  in  per- 
petual captivity.  Justice  could  not  be  more  openly  insulted. 

But  for  Elizabeth  also  her  halcyon  days  were  from  that 
moment  finished,  and  the  expiation  of  justice  began.  Mary 
Stuart  a  prisoner  was  more  dangerous  than  she  had  ever 
been  upon  the  throne,  for  she  became  the  standard  of 
Catholicism;  and  by  her  beauty  and  misfortune  she  was  the 
cause  of  a  long  succession  of  internal  plots  and  of  foreign 
menaces.  Philip  II.  pensioned  the  English  who  had  fled  to 
him,  and  opened  for  their  Catholic  priests  seminaries  in 
Flanders,  in  order  to  keep  the  English  coast  under  the  per- 
petual menace  of  an  invasion  more  formidable  than  that  of 
a  band  of  soldiers.  In  1570  Pope  Pius  V.  excommunicated 
the  Queen  of  England  and  absolved  all  her  subjects  from 
their  oath  of  allegiance ;  the  same  year  took  place  the  con- 
spiracy of  the  Duke  of  Norfolk  and  the  insurrection  of  the 
earls  of  Northumberland  and  Westmoreland.  The  move- 
ment was  above  all  Catholic.  Upon  their  banner  the  insur- 
gents had  painted  Jesus  Chrrst  crucified,  with  five  bleeding 
wounds.  They  formed  an  army  of  1000  horse  and.  5000  or 
6000  foot;  but  they  did  not  dare  to  advance  into  the  south, 
and  dispersed  without  battle.  In  1571  another  revolt 
was  likewise  repressed.  In  1572  Norfolk  again  began  his 
intrigues.  Mary  Stuart  promised  him  her  hand.  The  plot 
was  discovered;  Norfolk  was  arrested,  condemned  to  death, 
and  executed. 

However,  the  struggle  between  Catholicism  and  the  Ref- 
ormation assumed  a  character  of  desperate  atrocity.  In 
France  it  was  St.  Bartholomew;  in  Spain  the  autos-da-ft ; 
in  the  Netherlands  the  executions  of  the  Duke  of  Alva. 

Menaced  by  Philip  II.,  Elizabeth  assisted  all  his  enemies. 
"The  last  day  of  France,"  said  she,  "will  be  the  eventide 
of  the  last  day  of  England ;"  and  she  sent  money,  arms,  and 
soldiers  to  the  Huguenots  of  France,  to  the  revolted  Flem- 
ings, and  to  the  Moors  of  the  Alpujarras.  Her  corsairs  car- 
ried on  a  war  of  privateering  much  more  favorable  to  the 
English  than  to  the  Spaniards,  as  the  former  had  neither  a 
large  commerce  nor  colonies  nor  vulnerable  points.  In  five 
years  their  prizes  amounted  to  25,000,000  francs.  In  1577 


216  THE   CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.         [BOOK  IV. 

Drake  forced  all  the  cities  of  the  Chilian  and  Peruvian 
coasts  to  pay  ransom,  captured  a  number  of  ships,  and  after 
having  made  the  circuit  of  the  world  returned  at  the  end  of 
three  years  with  a  booty  of  800,000  livres  (1580).  Caven- 
dish in  1585  a  second  time  ravaged  the  Spanish  colonies  of 
the  West  Indies.  The  same  year  Elizabeth  signed  a  treaty 
of  alliance  with  the  Flemings  and  sent  them  6000  men  under 
her  favorite,  the  Earl  of  Leicester. 

Philip  II.  began  another  war.  Instead  of  openly  attacking 
the  queen  he  sought  to  overturn  her  by  means  of  the  Eng- 
lish Catholics,  whom  she  held  under  the  most  cruel  oppres- 
sion. Whoever  celebrated  the  mass  or  simply  heard  it  was 
condemned  to  one  year's  imprisonment  and  to  a  fine  of  100 
marks.  There  were  often  domiciliary  visits,  preventive  im- 
prisonments, executions.  For  evil  remarks  against  the  queen 
one  was  sent  the  first  time  to  the  pillory,  the  second  time  he 
lost  his  ears,  the  third  time  his  head.  It  is  by  no  means 
astonishing  that  the  Catholics  wished  to  shake  off  an  odious 
yoke.  Numerous  plots  were  formed:  a  priest  and  an  English 
Jesuit,  William  Allen  and  Robert  Parsons,  were  the  soul  of 
them.  More  than  200  persons  belonging  to  all  ranks  of  soci- 
ety mounted  the  scaffold.  In  every  Catholic  the  Protestants 
saw  a  conspirator,  and  there  was  formed  an  association 
of  which  the  adherents  agreed  to  pursue  even  to  death  not 
only  the  persons  who  should  make  an  attempt  against  the 
life  of  the  queen,  but  also  those  in  favor  of  whom  such 
attempts  should  be  made.  This  last  clause  was  directed 
against  Mary  Stuart  (1584).  A  new  plot  brought  the  Queen 
of  Scotland  herself  to  trial.  Antony  Babington,  a  young 
English  Catholic  of  an  enthusiastic  character,  had  resolved 
to  assassinate  Elizabeth  and  deliver  Mary.  He  was 
executed  with  two  of  his  accomplices.  They  were  dis- 
emboweled alive  (1586). 

This  time  Mary  was  brought  before  an  English  commis- 
sion chosen  from  among  her  most  ardent  persecutors.  She 
refused  at  first  to  recognize  the  jurisdiction  to  which  they 
claimed  to  subject  her.  When  the  letter  was  read  to  her  by 
which  Elizabeth  announced  her  arraignment  she  replied  with 
indignation:  "What!  do  your  ministers  believe,  then,  that  I 
will  degrade  my  rank,  my  state,  the  race  from  which  I 
descend,  the  son  who  will  succeed  me,  the  kings  and  foreign 
princes  whose  rights  are  outraged  in  my  person?  Never!' 
She  consented,  however,  to  appear  before  her  judges.  Her 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  217 

defense  was  able,  often  eloquent,  always  worthy.  The  pro- 
ceedings, begun  with  contempt  of  right,  continued  with 
contempt  of  forms.  Mary  was  not  confronted  with  wit- 
nesses; they  refused  to  produce  the  originals  of  her  letters. 
She  was  none  the  less  condemned  to  death  by  all  the  com- 
missioners (October  25,  1586).  Parliament  approved  the 
sentence.  Elizabeth  hesitated  four  months  to  execute  the 
unjust  decision,  not  that  she  was  swayed  by  any  sentiment 
of  pity,  but  through  fear  of  her  reputation.  She  endeavored 
to  have  Mary  poisoned.  The  jailer  being  incorruptible,  she 
surrendered  the  poor  fugitive  queen  to  the  executioner. 
Mary  displayed  upon  the  scaffold  the  most  heroic  courage. 
"  Carry  these  tidings, "  she  said  to  her  faithful  attendant 
Andrew  Melvil,  "that  I  die  firm  in  my  religion,  true  Scotch, 
true  French."  She  gave  her  blessing  to  all  her  attendants, 
who  burst  into  tears.  Even  the  executioner  on  his  knees 
begged  her  for  pardon  (February  18,  1587). 

This  odious  execution  ended  the  plots  of  the  Catholics 
against  Elizabeth.  James  VI.  himself  became  reconciled  to 
her  who  had  slain  his  mother,  but  who  could  bequeath  or 
deprive  him  of  a  crown. 

Philip  II.  alone  endeavored  to  avenge  Mary  Stuart;  he 
wished  still  more  to  humble  this  Protestant  England,  the 
principal  bulwark  of  heresy.  June  3,  158*8,  there  issued  from 
the  mouth  of  the  Tagus  the  most  formidable  armament  which 
Christendom  had  ever  beheld — 135  great  ships,  8000  sailors, 
19,000  soldiers,  the  flower  of  the  Spanish  nobility,  and 
Lope  de  Vega  upon  the  fleet  to  sing  of  the  victory.  The 
Spaniards,  intoxicated  with  the  spectacle,  designated  the 
fleet  with  the  name  of  the  Invincible  Armada.  In  the 
Netherlands  it  was  to  rejoin  the  Duke  of  Parma  and  protect 
the  passage  of  33,000  veteran  soldiers.  The  forest  of 
Vae's  in  Flanders  had  been  converted  into  transports. 

The  alarm  in  England  was  extreme ;  at  the  doors  of  the 
churches  were  shown  instruments  of  torture  such  as  the 
inquisitors  were  bringing  upon  the  Spanish  fleet.  The 
hatred  of  the  foreigner  caused  even  religious  hatreds  to  be 
forgotten.  The  Catholics  flocked  in  crowds  in  every  county 
under  the  standard  of  the  lord  lieutenant.  One  of  them, 
Lord  Montagu,  came  to  offer  to  the  queen  a  regiment  of 
cavalry  commanded  by  himself,  his  son,  and  grandson.  The 
queen  appeared  on  horseback  before  the  militia  assembled 
at  Tilbury  and  promised  to  die  for  her  people. 


2l8  THE    CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.         [Boon  IV, 

But  the  strength  of  England  was  in  its  marine.  The  city 
of  London  alone  equipped  38  vessels,  and  the  entire  fleet 
consisted  of  191  ships,  carrying  15,272  men.  Under  Admi- 
ral Howard  served  the  ablest  seamen  of  the  century — Drake, 
Hawkins,  Frobisher.  The  little  English  vessels  harassed 
the  Spanish  fleet  when  it  appeared  (July  31)  in  sight  of  the 
coasts  of  England.  The  Spanish  fleet  sailed  northward  as 
far  as  Calais  to  take  on  board  the  troops  of  Flanders,  who 
were  blockaded  by  the  Dutch;  but  ill-treated  by  the  ele- 
ments, assailed  without  relaxation  by  the  English  and  their 
fireships,  the  Spanish  fleet  was  unable  to  embark  the  troops. 
The  remains  of  this  formidable  armament,  driven  by  the 
tempest  upon  the  banks  of  Scotland  and  Ireland,  which  they 
rounded  to  avoid  encounter  with  the  enemy  in  the  Channel, 
came  to  hide  in  the  ports  of  Spain  the  shame  and  powerless- 
ness  of  Philip  II.  The  expedition  had  cost  120,000,000 
ducats;  only  46  ships  had  escaped  the  disaster,  and  14,000 
soldiers  had  perished.  Thus  a  project  to  which  Philip  had 
devoted  five  years  of  labor  and  eighteen  of  reflection  utterly 
miscarried  in  four  days. 

The  remainder  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  was  abroad  only 
an  uninterrupted  round  of  success.  She  frustrated  the 
efforts  of  Philip  II.  to  stir  up  the  Catholics  of  Ireland.  An 
English  fleet  even  penetrated  the  Tagus  with  impunity,  and 
another  sacked  Cadiz  (1596).  The  King  of  Spain  exhausted 
his  arsenals  and  his  treasures  to  equip  a  new  armada:  that 
too  the  tempest  destroyed.  This  last  attempt  completed  the 
destruction  of  the  Spanish  marine.  That  of  Portugal  had 
fallen  at  the  same  time  and  by  the  same  blow.  When  Philip 
II.  was  informed  of  the  disaster  to  the  Great  Armada  and  of 
this  painful  end  of  his  most  cherished  hopes  he  remained  im- 
passive and  menacing.  "A  branch  has  been  cut  off,"  said 
he,  "but  the  tree  is  still  flourishing."  No,  the  tree  was 
drained  of  its  sap  and  withered.  The  war  with  England 
had  ruined  the  marine  and  the  commerce  of  Spain  as  the 
intervention  in  France  had  exhausted  its  gold  and  humbled 
its  military  renown. 

The  struggle  betweeen  the  two  religions  in  France  began  by 
a  plot.  The  Reformed  party,  who  had  just  been  persecuted 
.  .  by  Henry  II.,  and  who  under  Francis  II., 

wars' in  France  the  husband  of  Mary  Stuart,  were  still  threat- 
(1562-98).  ened  by  the  Guises,  united  with  the  malcon- 

tents of  every  sort  whom  the  favor  shown  the  princes  of 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  2*9 

Lorraine  had  excited,  and  believed  themselves  strong  enough 
to  seize  the  government.  Such  is  the  meaning  of  the  con- 
spiracy of  Amboise,  of  which  the  real  head  was  the  Prince  of 
Conde  and  the  apparent  head  a  gentleman  named  de  la 
Renaudie  (1560).  But  the  government  was  then  in  virile 
hands.  The  Guises,  warned  in  time,  put  themselves  on 
their  guard  and  the  conspirators  found  themselves  taken  in  a 
trap.  The  Guises  dishonored  their  victory  by  atrocious  acts 
of  revenge;  they  even  wished  to  strike  off  the  head  of  a 
prince  of  the  blood,  Louis  of  Bourbon,  when  Francis  died 
at  the  age  of  seventeen.  Catherine  de  Medici,  become 
regent  of  her  son  Charles  IX.  (1560),  discontinued  for  a 
time  this  merciless  policy  and  heeded  the  advice  of  Michel 
de  1'Hopital,  whom  she  had  appointed  chancellor.  This 
great  magistrate  wished  to  impose  toleration  upon  all  parties. 
He  was  "one  of  those  noble  souls,  struck  after  an  antique 
pattern — another  Cato  the  Censor;  he  resembled  him  with 
his  great  white  beard,  his  pale  complexion,  his  grave  air." 
When  after  the  defeat  of  the  conspirators  of  Amboise  the 
Guises,  excited  by  their  success  and  thinking  to  make  an 
end,  demanded  the  establishment  of  the  Spanish  Inquisition, 
L'Hopital  replied,  "What  need  of  so  many  funeral  piles  and 
tortures?  Adorned  with  virtues  and  fortified  by  good 
manners,  resist  heresy."  He  further  said,  "Let  us  reject 
these  devilish  words,  partisan  and  seditious  names,  Lutheran, 
Huguenot,  Papist:  let  us  not  change  the  name  of  Christian." 
He  had  already  during  the  life  of  the  preceding  king  caused 
the  edict  of  Romorantin  to  be  issued,  which,  while  conferring 
upon  the  bishops  cognizance  of  the  crime  of  heresy,  at 
least  prevented  the  introduction  into  France  of  the  Inquisi- 
tion. By  the  edict  of  July,  1561,  while  declaring  Protestant 
reunions  unlawful,  he  accorded  a  general  amnesty,  and  sus- 
pended the  execution  of  condemnations  in  matters  of  religion. 
By  that  of  January,  1562,  he  took  a  farther  step.  Believing 
himself  strong  enough  to  put  in  practice  his  ideas  of  tolera- 
tion, he  authorized  the  Calvinist  worship  in  the  country  and 
in  unwalled  cities  while  forbidding  the  Protestants  to  hold 
assemblies  and  to  collect  troops. 

Party  spirit  was  too  hot  to  heed  the  language  of  an 
upright  man  and  sincere  Christian.  The  concessions  made 
to  the  Protestants  only  exasperated  the  excited  Catholics  and 
rendered  the  Guises  popular.  Catherine  hoped  that  a  con- 
ference between  the  theologians  of  the  two  faiths  would 


220  THE   CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.         [BOOK  IV. 

bring  back  concord.  The  Colloquy  of  Poissy,  disturbed  by 
mutual  invectives,  rendered  the  division  still  more  inevi- 
table. The  Duke  of  Guise  made  intimate  alliance  with  Mont- 
morency  and  St.  Andre.  The  Protestants  denounced  the 
triumvirate,  and  prepared  "to  defend  the  cause  with  shots 
from  the  arquebuse, "  as  Theodore  de  Beza  advised. 

The  massacre  of  Vassy  was  the  signal  for  hostilities, 
which  during  thirty-two  years  were  seven  times  suspended 
by  precarious  and  badly  observed  treaties,  and  seven  times 
recommenced. 

March  i,  1562,  the  Duke  of  Guise  was  passing  through 
Vassy  in  Champagne.  It  was  Sunday,  and  he  alighted  to 
attend  mass.  The  songs  of  a  thousand  Protestants  who  had 
met  in  a  barn  near  by  reached  his  ears.  Some  of  his  people 
wished  to  stop  what  they  called  an  insult  and  defiance  to 
their  duke,  and  on  the  refusal  of  the  Protestants  attacked 
them  sword  in  hand.  The  latter  defended  themselves  with 
stones.  The  Duke  of  Guise,  hastening  to  the  assistance  of 
his  followers,  was  struck  in  the  cheek;  then  all  his  retinue 
threw  themselves  upon  this  pitiful  unarmed  crowd,  slew 
60  and  wounded  above  200,  without  distinction  of  age  or  sex. 

This  massacre  made  the  Protestants  rush  to  arms.  Philip 
II.  and  Elizabeth  took  part  in  this  first  struggle.  At  the 
time  of  the  conspiracy  of  Amboise  the  King  of  Spain  had  said 
to  the  Guises,  "If  you  wish  to  chastise  the  rebels  I  am  at 
your  service."  After  the  Colloquy  of  Poissy  the  Cardinal 
of  Lorraine  in  the  name  of  the  French  clergy  begged  his  in- 
tervention, and  as  soon  as  he  knew  that  the  sword  had 
been  drawn  he  sent  to  Montluc,  "the  Catholic  butcher," 
3000  men  from  those  veteran  Spanish  bands  which  were 
characterized  by  a  gallantry  at  once  so  calm  and  so 
ferocious.  The  Queen  of  England  on  her  side  gave  to  Conde 
as  many  soldiers  and  as  much  money  on  condition  that 
Havre  should  be  delivered  to  her  as  a  guarantee  for  the  sums 
she  had  advanced.  Guise  took  Rouen,  and  the  war  com- 
menced. It  was  not  merely  an  open  and  loyal  contest  be- 
tween armies;  they  attacked  each  other  from  city  to  city, 
from  castle  to  castle,  from  house  to  house.  The  Protestants 
slew  like  the  Catholics,  but  in  addition  they  devastated  the 
churches,  violated  the  tombs,  and  broke  the  statues  to  pieces. 
How  many  masterpieces  then  perished!  The  French 
churches  still  bear  the  marks  of  those  ravages.  Conde" 
with  7000  men,  received  as  re-enforcements  from  the 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  221 

Protestants  of  Germany,  attacked  the  suburbs  of  Paris. 
Repulsed  by  the  Spaniards,  he  fell  back  toward  Havre  and 
joined  the  English  so  as  to  come  back  in  greater  force, 
but  on  his  return  was  stopped  near  Dreux  by  the  Duke  of 
Guise  (December  19,  1562).  There  fifteen  or  sixteen  thou- 
sand men  on  each  side  confronted  each  other.  Conde  in  a 
first  charge,  during  which  he  wounded  and  made  prisoner 
the  Duke  of  Montmorency,  broke  the  Catholic  center;  but 
the  Royal  Swiss  restored  the  fight,  and  the  Duke  of  Guise 
completed  the  victory  by  a  flank  movement.  The  Prince 
of  Conde  was  captured. 

It  was  a  great  success  for  Guise.  Of  his  two  influential 
rivals  one,  the  Marshal  St.  Andre,  was  killed ;  the  other, 
Montmorency,  was  a  captive;  and  he  held  the  chief  even  of 
the  Huguenot  army.  He  treated  him  chivalrously,  wished 
him  to  share  his  bed,  and  slept  side  by  side  with  his  mortal 
enemy,  who  acknowledged  he  was  not  able  to  close  his  eyes. 
The  first  tidings  that  came  to  Catherine  de  Medici  announced 
the  battle  lost.  "Very  well,"  she  calmly  replied,  "we  shall 
pray  to  God  in  French."  The  Guises  terrified  her,  and 
when  she  learned  the  truth  they  terrified  her  still  more  de- 
spite the  joy  she  pretended  at  their  success;  she  spoke  of 
negotiating,  and  published  a  decree  of  amnesty  for  all  those 
who  should  lay  down  their  arms.  But  Guise  by  no  means 
meant  that  those  should  be  raised  up  whom  he  had  cast 
down:  he  violently  followed  up  his  victory  and  besieged 
Orleans  in  order  to  cut  off  communications  between  the 
Protestants  of  the  north  and  south.  The  city  could  not  have 
long  resisted  had  it  not  been  for  the  crime  of  a  fanatic.  A 
Protestant,  Poltrot  de  Mere,  inflamed  by  the  examples  of 
Judith  and  Deborah,  of  Ehud  and  Jael,  came  into  the  camp 
of  the  Duke  of  Guise  as  a  deserter,  and  finding  him  alone 
one  evening,  shot  at  him  with  a  pistol  and  mortally  wounded 
him  (February  18,  1563). 

Guise  dead,  Conde  and  Montmorency  captive,  the  queen 
mother  remained  mistress  of  the  government.  She  saw 
clearly  what  these  ambitious  men  wished  at  the  bottom — the 
triumph  of  the  creed  doubtless,  but  also  that  of  their  power; 
she  saw  that  the  civil  war  was  disturbing  respect  for  royal 
authority.  "What  king,"  said  the  Protestants  in  the  report 
of  Montluc  when  spoken  to  concerning  Charles  IX.;  "we 
are  the  kings.  He  whom  you  speak  of  is  a  little  phantom 
of  a  king;  we  will  flog  him  well  and  give  him  a  trade  to  teach 


222  THE   CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.         [BOOK  IV. 

him  how  to  get  his  living  like  other  people."  And  the 
peasants  in  their  turn  refused  the  ancient  dues  to  the  lords. 
"Let  them  show  us  in  the  Bible,"  said  they,  "if  we  are  to 
pay  or  not.  If  our  ancestors  have  been  fools  and  beasts 
we  do  not  wish  to  be."  All  the  social  edifice  was  shaken. 
Catherine  de  Medici  in  order  to  arrest  this  agitation  offered 
peace  to  Conde;  he  signed  it  at  Amboise  in  return  for  an 
edict  which  authorized  Protestant  worship  in  the  houses  of 
the  nobles,  throughout  the  domains  of  lords  justiciary,  and 
in  one  city  of  each  district  (March  12,  1563). 

In  order  to  show  their  good  accord  Catholics  and  Protes- 
tants in  common  made  an  expedition  against  Havre,  which 
the  English  wished  to  keep,  and  which  would  have  been 
worth  more  to  them  than  Calais. 

The  edict  of  Amboise  was  executed  at  first  with  loyalty 
on  the  part  of  the  government.  But  political  and  religious 
hatreds  were  too  strong  to  be  appeased  at  the  will  of  the 
court:  instead  of  civil  war  there  were  assassinations.  To 
appease  the  nobles  Catherine  multiplied  about  her  festivi- 
ties and  pleasures:  in  consequence  manners  became  worse 
and  the  peace  was  not  better.  Besides,  the  queen  found  the 
Bourbons  too  powerful.  As  formerly  in  the  presence  of  the 
great  Guise  she  had  inclined  to  the  Reform  party  so  in  the 
presence  of  Conde  she  leaned  toward  the  Catholics.  Little 
by  little  she  limited  the  guarantees  accorded  the  Protes- 
tants. Crimes  against  them  were  not  searched  out.  As 
soon  as  the  king  became  of  age  his  mother  led  him  through 
the  southern  provinces  in  order  to  show  him  to  the  people, 
removing  the  governors  suspected  of  Calvinism,  and  having 
the  fortifications  of  the  Protestant  cities  destroyed.  Finally, 
at  Bayonne  she  held  long  conferences  with  the  Duke  of  Alva. 
Her  meeting  with  such  a  man  naturally  excited  the  anxiety 
of  the  Huguenots.  It  was  reported  that  the  general  of 
Philip  II.  had  advised  the  queen  to  massacre  the  heretical 
leaders,  saying  that  "the  head  of  a  salmon  was  worth  more 
than  that  of  10,000  frogs." 

The  two  parties  sought  to  surprise  each  other :  the  Prot- 
estants collected  money  and  prepared  their  arms;  Catherine 
reorganized  the  royal  army  and  levied  in  Switzerland  6000 
men.  Conde  attempted  a  bold  stroke;  he  endeavored  to  sur- 
prise the  court  at  Monceaux.  Catherine  had  only  time  to 
escape  to  Meaux,  whence  the  court  gained  Paris  under  the 
protection  of  the  Swiss  infantry.  Conde  with  4000  men 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  223 

dared  to  blockade  the  capital.  The  inhabitants  forced  the 
aged  Montmorency  to  go  out  to  give  battle.  The  action 
occurred  near  St.  Denis;  but  the  constable  arranged  his 
troops  badly  and  was  killed.  There  were,  however,  neither 
vanquished  nor  victors.  If  the  field  of  battle  remained 
with  the  Catholics,  the  Huguenots  on  the  morrow  offered  a 
new  encounter  which  the  royal  army  did  not  accept  (1567). 

A  short  time  after  Conde  received  6000  lansquenets. 
At  once  these  foreigners  demanded  their  pay.  All 
the  Huguenot  army,  chiefs  and  soldiers,  assessed  them- 
selves to  furnish  it.  They  then  marched  upon  Chartres  in 
order  to  cut  off  from  Paris  arrivals  from  Beauce.  The 
queen  mother,  who  had  not  wished,  through  jealousy  of 
power,  to  give  a  successor  to  the  constable,  had  no  com- 
mander to  pit  against  the  Reformers.  L'Hopital  assumed 
the  control  and  spoke  of  peace;  it  was  made  at  Longjumeau 
(March  23)  on  condition  that  the  Protestants  restore  the 
places  which  they  occupied,  but  that  the  edict  of  Amboise 
should  be  re-established  without  restriction. 

It  was,  as  they  said  of  the  next  peace,  "a  peace  lame  and 
badly  settled."  Catherine  de  Medici  had  signed  it  only  to 
make  another  war.  She  proposed  to  kidnap  the  same  day 
Conde  and  Coligny  in  Burgundy,  and  Jeanne  d'Albret,  the 
widow  of  Anthony  of  Bourbon,  in  Beam,  and  to  make  them 
undergo  the  fate  of  Counts  Horn  and  Egmont.  They  all 
three  escaped.  Conde  and  Coligny  after  a  ride  of  one 
hundred  leagues  reached  La  Rochelle,  where  Jeanne  d'Albret 
rejoined  them  with  her  son,  Henry  of  Beam. 

Catherine  had  therefore  missed  her  blow,  but  she  believed 
herself  ready  for  war.  She  declared  it  by  issuing  an  edict 
which  prohibited  on  pain  of  death  the  exercise  of  the  pre- 
tended Reformed  religion,  and  ordered  the  Protestant 
ministers  to  quit  the  country  in  fifteen  days.  All  the  mem- 
bers of  Parliament  and  of  the  universities  were  obliged  to 
take  the  Catholic  oath.  To  sustain  such  edicts  powerful 
forces  were  necessary;  the  court  had  only  an  army  of  18,000 
foot  and  4000  horse.  It  was  placed  under  the  command  of 
the  young  Duke  of  Anjou,  whom  Catherine  wished  to  put 
forward  so  she  might  at  need  oppose  him  to  his  brother, 
Charles  IX.;  Tavannes  and  Biron  were  to  direct  him. 

A  first  campaign  in  the  winter  was  without  result;  in  the 
following  spring  Marshal  de  Tavannes  wished  to  isolate  the 
Protestant  army  in  the  south  from  the  German  re-enforce- 


224  THE   CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.         [BOOK  IV. 

ments  which  it  expected  from  the  north,  and  to  beat  it  before 
their  arrival.  They  maneuvered  for  some  time  on  the  Cha- 
rente;  finally,  Tavannes  surprised  the  Protestant  rearguard 
near  Jarnac  (March  13,  1569).  Conde  was  captured  and 
assassinated  after  the  battle.  The  death  of  this  brave  and 
energetic  prince,  for  nine  years  the  head  and  right  arm  of 
the  party,  was  a  terrible  blow.  The  Protestants  were  dis- 
couraged; a  great-hearted  woman  raised  them  up.  Jeanne 
d'Albret  brought  into  the  midst  of  the  army  her  son,  Henry 
of  Beam,  and  the  young  Prince  of  Conde.  "My  friends," 
said  she,  "behold  two  new  leaders  whom  God  gives  you  and 
two  orphans  whom  I  intrust  to  you."  The  Prince  of  Beam, 
born  at  Pau,  austerely  brought  up  as  a  country  gentleman, 
was  then  only  fifteen.  Simple,  brave,  and  intelligent,  know- 
ing how  to  find  those  words  which  delight,  he  pleased  all; 
he  was  appointed  generalissimo  with  Coligny  as  adviser  and 
lieutenant. 

Coligny  had  many  of  the  qualities  necessary  to  a  partisan 
chief  in  such  a  war.  A  convinced  and  austere  Protestant, 
he  was  loved  and  respected  by  the  ministers  as  well  as  by 
the  soldiers;  he  was  not  perhaps  a  very  great  general  nor  a 
very  profound  politician,  but  he  never  allowed  himself  to  be 
cast  down,  which  is  one  element  of  great  strength;  he  saw 
clearly,  which  is  another:  he  knew  how  to  find  resources  in 
everything;  and  if  there  was  no  reason  for  anticipating  from 
him  a  decisive  victory  there  was  no  more  ground  for  fearing 
an  irretrievable  defeat. 

Jarnac  had  been  only  a  fight  of  the  rearguard,  and  the 
Protestants  had  lost  there  only  400  men.  Coligny  remained 
therefore  strong  enough  to  defend  Cognac  and  Angouleme. 
Rejoined  by  13,000  Germans,  he  even  assumed  the  offen- 
sive, and  made  the  Catholic  army  experience  a  check  near 
La  Roche-Abeille.  But  Tavannes  remedied  the  disaster. 
Catholic  Germans  and  Spaniards  sent  by  the  Duke  of 
Alva,  and  Italians  sent  by  Pope  Pius  V.,  increased  the 
forces  of  the  Duke  of  Anjou.  Already  driven  to  the  Loire, 
the  duke  retraced  his  steps,  by  a  diversion  relieved  Poitiers, 
which  Coligny  besieged  for  six  weeks,  and  succeeded  in 
taking  the  Protestant  army  between  the  Dive  and  the 
Thoue  near  Montcontour.  The  position  was  detestable; 
6000  Huguenot  soldiers  were  left  upon  the  battlefield 
(October  3). 

The  victory  of  Montcontour  was,however,fruitless,  like  that 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  225 

of  Jarnac.  Charles  IX.,  jealous  of  the  laurels  which  they 
were  gathering  for  his  brother,  came  to  the  army,  and  instead 
of  pursuing  the  Protestants  as  far  as  the  Pyrenees  lost  his 
time  in  besieging  Niort  and  St.  Jean  d'Angely.  Coligny 
traversed  the  south  in  all  its  breadth,  constantly  increasing 
his  army,  and  suddenly  appeared  in  Burgundy  at  the  head 
of  all  the  Protestant  nobility  of  Dauphine  and  Provence. 
A  Catholic  army  of  12,000  men  wished  to  arrest  him  at 
Arnay  le  Due;  he  beat  it  and  reached  the  Loing  a  short 
distance  from  Paris. 

The  truth  was  evident:  they  could  never  by  war  obtain 
the  mastery  over  this  party  always  conquered,  never  de- 
stroyed; something  else  was  necessary.  To  disarm  the  Prot- 
estants Catherine  de  Medici  had  them  granted  the  treaty  of 
St.  Germain  under  very  favorable  conditions:  the  free  exer- 
cise of  worship  in  two  cities  of  each  province  and  in  all  those 
where  it  was  established;  the  eligibility  of  the  Calvinists  for 
all  offices ;  and  four  cities  of  safety,  La  Rochelle,  Cognac, 
Montauban,  and  La  Charite,  where  the  Reform  party  could 
keep  a  garrison  (August  8,  1570).  "An  evil  and  abortive 
peace,  veritably  a  cutthroat  peace." 

At  the  news  of  this  treaty  there  was  only  one  cry  of  indig- 
nation among  foreign  and  French  Catholics.  Catherine  de 
Medici  was  not  moved  and  followed  her  entirely  new  policy. 
The  marriage  of  the  young  Prince  of  Beam  with  Marguerite, 
sister  of  Charles  IX. ,  could  forever  cement  the  peace;  she  put 
it  forward.  It  was  in  the  interest  of  France  to  find  occupa- 
tion abroad  for  the  warlike  and  mutinous  spirit  of  the  Prot- 
estant nobility;  she  accepted  the  propositions  which  Coligny 
made  her  of  conducting  his  co-religionists  into  the  Nether- 
lands, where  the  Duke  of  Alva  had  just  caused  the  death 
under  torture  of  18,000  persons.  Such  an  enterprise 
pleased  the  Huguenots  and  seemed  a  return  to  the  former 
foreign  policy  forgotten  since  the  death  of  Henry  II.  In  a 
war  with  Spain  Coligny  saw  a  means  of  maintaining  glori- 
ously and  surely  peace  in  France. 

Charles  IX.  was  then  twenty-one,  of  good  intellect,  but  of 
a  character  at  once  feeble  and  violent;  spoiled  by  absolute 
power,  surrounded  by  Italian  favorites  who  perverted  his 
heart,  he  played  very  well  and  sometimes  unwittingly  the 
role  which  his  mother  left  him.  He  had  more  than  once 
found  that  the  Huguenot  chiefs  carried  their  heads  too  high, 
and  had  not  forgotten  the  homicidal  counsels  given  him  by 


226  THE   CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.          [BOOK  IV. 

the  Duke  of  Alva  at  Bayonne.  But  then  he  was  impatient 
of  his  mother's  yoke  and  envious  of  the  victories  ascribed 
to  his  brother.  Inconstant  and  passionate,  he  entered  with 
ardor  into  new  projects,  wrote  to  Coligny, .to  Jeanne  d' Albret, 
and  urged  the  prompt  conclusion  of  the  marriage  of  Henry  of 
Beam  with  his  sister.  The  Queen  of  Navarre  decided  to 
come  to  Paris;  so  too  did  the  admiral.  "At  last  we  have 
you,  my  father,"  said  to  him  the  young  king,  embracing  him, 
"and  you  will  not  escape  from  us  when  you  wish."  Follow- 
ing their  chieftain  a  number  of  Huguenot  gentlemen  hastened 
to  have  their  share  in  the  festivites  and  in  the  good  graces 
of  the  king. 

Catherine  herself  was  terrified  ;  she  had  too  well  succeeded. 
The  king  saw  only  through  the  eyes  of  Coligny ;  he  was  im- 
patient for  the  arrival  of  the  dispensation  of  the  marriage, 
which  the  Pope  wished  to  refuse;  he  had  troops  levied  for 
Coligny,  and  collected  a  fleet  against  Flanders.  The  Protes- 
tants, encouraged,  drew  up  in  synod  at  La  Rochelle  the 
confession  which  still  serves  as  their  rule  of  faith  to-day. 
Catherine  made  remonstrances  to  her  son,  who  received  them 
very  ill;  he  seemed  then  determined  to  acquire  "glory  and 
reputation  by  the  Spanish  war,"  and  he  replied  to  his  mother 
that  he  had  no  greater  enemies  than  she  and  her  son,  the  Duke 
of  Anjou.  But  the  fates  were  working  for  Catherine.  The 
Duke  of  Anjou,  the  Guises,  Tavannes,  all  the  Catholic  lords 
who  had  fought  agaist  the  Reform,  saw  with  wrath  the  in- 
fluence passing  to  their  enemies.  Philip  II.,  menaced  with 
a  war  in  the  Netherlands  which  he  was  not  in  a  condition  to 
sustain,  used  the  arguments  of  religion  and  fear.  He  again 
pointed  out  to  Charles  IX.  the  dangers  to  which  heresy  ex- 
posed kings,  and  proposed  an  offensive  and  defensive  alliance 
against  this  common  enemy  of  crowns.  All  means  being 
good,  he  scattered  money  among  the  people  to  excite 
troubles.  When  the  court  came  to  Paris  with  its  corftge 
of  Huguenot  gentlemen  and  Protestant  ministers  "the  blood" 
of  the  Parisians  "boiled,"  all  of  whom  were  Catholic.  One 
event  first  troubled  men's  minds.  Jeanne  d'Albret  died 
suddenly  (July  9).  Poison  was  suspected.  When  the  mar- 
riage was  celebrated  (August  18)  a  riot  at  the  door  of  Notre 
Dame  was  prevented  with  great  difficulty;  the  pulpits  in  all 
the  churches  resounded  with  maledictions  against  the  Hugue- 
nots, who  made  no  little  bravado  in  the  streets. 

Catherine  then  devised  the  most  Machiavellian  plan;  this 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  227 

was  to  have  Coligny  assassinated  by  the  Guises ;  the  Hugue- 
nots would  avenge  their  chief  upon  the  latter;  then  the  royal 
troops  should  fall  upon  them  both  as  disturbers  of  the  public 
peace.  August  22,  when  going  out  from  the  Louvre  Coligny 
was  shot  by  Maureval,  a  professional  assassin  in  the  pay  of 
the  Duke  of  Guise.  At  the  first  tidings  of  the  attempt 
Charles  IX.  hastened  to  the  admiral.  "The  suffering  is 
yours,"  he  said,  "the  insult  and  the  outrage  belong  to  me," 
and  he  swore  to  take  revenge. 

The  following  day  the  king  seemed  to  entertain  the  same 
sentiments;  but  the  queen  came  upon  him  with  the  Duke  of 
Anjou,  the  Duke  of  Angouleme,  Tavannes,  the  Chancellor 
Birague,  the  Marshal  de  Retz,  and  the  Duke  of  Nevers,  the 
last  three  of  whom  were  Italians;  she  represented  that  the  two 
parties  were  ready  to  come  to  blows,  that  each  of  them 
would  choose  a  chief,  and  that  there  would  be  left  the  king 
only  his  title,  if  that  still  remained.  "The  war  is  inevitable," 
said  Tavannes;  "it  is  better  to  win  it  at  Paris  than  to  put  it 
in  doubt  in  the  open  field."  They  hesitated  still  as  to  the 
number  of  the  victims.  "We  must  slay  all,"  said  one  of  the 
Italian  counselors,  "the  sin  being  no  less  for  few  than  for 
many."  Charles,  till  then  unmoved  and  gloomy,  suddenly 
cried  out  that  since  they  thought  it  good  to  kill  the  admiral 
he  wished  that  all  the  Huguenots  of  France  should  be  slain, 
'  'so  that  there  should  not  be  left  one  to  reproach  him  after- 
ward." 

The  Duke  of  Guise  took  the  execution  upon  himself.  We 
know  the  horrible  details.  We  know  also  that  Charles  re- 
ceived the  clamorous  and  enthusiastic  congratulations  of  the 
courts  of  Rome  and  Spain  for  the  "so  wise  and  so  holy 
resolution"  that  he  had  taken.  And  they  rejoiced  with 
him  at  "so  glorious  a  success."  "Be  well  persuaded," 
wrote  to  him  Philip  II., "that  when  doing  the  business  of  God 
you  will  do  your  own  still  better."  Herein  is  the  odious 
meaning  of  this  atrocious  policy.  And  in  case  of  war  he 
promised  everything,  men  and  money;  he  added,  "I  wish  I 
might  come  in  person  to  fight  beside  you.  In  my  absence 
the  Duke  of  Alva  will  act  with  all  necessary  zeal."  And  he 
entreated  him  "with  all  the  ardor  of  his  tenderness  to  con- 
tinue and  perfect  that  which  he  had  so  well  begun."  An 
abominable  characteristic  of  these  butcheries  is  found  in  the 
fact  that  personal  hatred,  professional  rivalry,  even  desire 
of  gain,  were  also  motives.  The  philosopher  Ramus  was 


228  THE   CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.         [BOOK  IV. 

slain  by  a  rival ;  at  Angers  the  Duke  of  Anjou  had  the  estates 
of  the  dead,  even  of  the  living,  carefully  put  under  seals,  and 
St.  Bartholomew's  was  not  for  him  alone  a  means  of  audit- 
ing his  accounts  and  of  filling  his  coffers. 

This  great  crime  was  useless  as  crimes  always  are.  The 
Protestants  had  lost  their  leaders;  the  first  moment  of  stupor 
passed,  they  resumed  their  arms  in  many  cities  with  desper- 
ate rage.  The  royal  army  made  proof  of  it  at  the  siege  of 
Sancerre  and  La  Rochelle.  The  Duke  of  Anjou  commanded 
before  the  latter  city  and  could  not  take  it.  Nimes,  Mon- 
tauban,  a  hundred  other  cities  where  the  Protestants  pre- 
dominated, had  closed  their  gates;  and  at  the  same  time  the 
queen  saw  formed  in  the  very  heart  of  the  Catholics  a  numer- 
ous party  favorable  if  not  to  the  Calvinists  at  least  to  ideas 
of  toleration.  Charles  IX.,  satiated  with  blood,  adopted 
more  humane  sentiments,  escaping  from  the  influence  of  his 
mother,  Rome,  and  Spain.  He  wrote  February  13  to  the 
Duke  of  Anjou,  then  before  La  Rochelle:  "I  pray  you  to  pre- 
fer gentleness  and  clemency,.  .  .  to  carry  kindness  even 
to  the  extremity  without  ever  losing  hope.  .  .  Force,  how- 
ever successful  it  may  be,  will  always  be  injurious  to  me,  inas- 
much as  from  the  ruin  of  my  cities  and  subjects  can  come  to 
me  only  loss."  The  peace  of  La  Rochelle  granted  the  Re- 
formed party  liberty  of  conscience.  They  therefore  issued 
victorious  from  astruggle  undertaken  for  their  extermination. 

The  divisions  of  their  adversaries  had  favored  their  heroic 
efforts.  St.  Bartholomew's  had  disunited  the  Catholics. 
Many  upright  souls  were  shocked;  and  the  Duke  of  Alencon, 
brother  of  the  king,  ambitiously  taking  advantage  of  these 
noble  sentiments,  there  was  formed  a  third  party  which  the 
two  extreme  opinions  agreed  to  stigmatize  by  the  name,  by 
no  means  a  dishonor,  of  the  "Prudents."  A  medley  of  mal- 
contents, of  ambitious  and  of  honorable  people,  the  new 
party,  weak  at  its  beginning  through  the  small  number  of  its 
followers  and  the  incoherency  of  it  elements,  was  to  grow 
powerful,  thanks  to  the  progress  of  tolerant  ideas.  To  it 
Henry  IV.  ultimately  owed  his  triumph. 

To  Charles  IX.,  who  died  in  1574,  succeeded  his  brother, 
Henry  III.,  chosen  some  time  previously  King  of  Poland. 
This  prince,  distinguished  by  his  intellect,  but  whose  vices 
merited  the  hatred  of  his  contemporaries  and  the  con- 
tempt of  posterity,  endeavored  to  put  in  practice  the  maxims 
of  Machiavelli,  his  favorite  author,  and  the  lessons  of  Cath- 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  229 

erine  de  Medici  by  opposing  the  two  parties  to  each  other  so 
they  should  be  mutually  destroyed. 

The  "Prudents"  had  united  with  the  Protestants,  Francis 
of  Alengon  with  Henry  of  Navarre,  who,  retained  in  cap- 
tivity since  St.  Bartholomew's,  had  just  escaped.  There 
followed  a  badly  conducted  war,  which  gained,  however,  for 
the  son  of  the  great  Guise,  surnamed  the  "Well  Scarred,"  a 
triumph  by  the  victory  of  Dormans,  which  he  won  over  the 
Germans  who  had  come  to  the  assistance  of  the  Reformers. 
To  this  fifth  civil  war  the  king  put  an  end  by  the  treaty  of 
Beaulieu,  giving  to  the  Prince  of  Conde  the  government  of 
Picardy. 

Jacques  d'Humieres,  Governor  of  Peronne,  protested 
against  this  appointment  and  united  more  than  500  gen- 
tlemen of  this  Catholic  province  in  an  association  for  the 
defense  of  the  faith.  This  example  was  soon  imitated ;  in 
a  short  time  every  province  had  its  league.  Henry  of  Guise 
skillfully  took  possession  of  this  scattered  force,  concentrated 
it  by  forming  a  single  association  of  all  the  individual  leagues, 
and  made  himself  its  chief.  From  that  moment  there  were 
two  kings  in  France. 

When  Henry  III.  convoked  the  States  General  at  Blois 
the  league,  actively  served  by  the  clergy,  especially  the 
monks  and  Jesuits,  in  fact  made  itself  master  of  the  elections 
and  controlled  the  Assembly.  The  king  was  compelled  to 
retract  the  edict  of  Beauvais.  The  Protestants  were  allowed 
six  months  in  which  to  make  their  abjuration.  But  at  the 
same  time  that  the  king  was  compelled  to  declare  war  against 
them  he  was  refused  the  means  of  carrying  it  on. 

From  lack  of  money  it  languished ;  the  Protestants  lost 
Issoire,  La  Charite,  and  Brouage.  Henry,  freed  from  the 
supervision  of  the  States  General,  improved  these  slight 
successes  to  sign  a  new  edict  of  pacification,  or  peace  of 
Bergerac;  this  granted  the  Protestants  a  more  extended  and 
better  specified  liberty  of  conscience  than  in  the  preceding 
edicts,  special  judges  in  the  eight  provincial  parliaments, 
nine  places  of  surety,  and  troops ;  but  it  assured  the  pre-emi- 
nence to  the  Roman  religion,  and  pronounced  the  abolition 
of  every  confederation  of  Catholics  as  well  as  of  Protestants 
(1577).  In  1580  took  place  a  seventh  appeal  to  arms  with- 
out importance,  marked  only  by  the  capture  of  Cahors, 
which  the  King  of  Navarre  overpowered.  It  was  terminated 
by  the  peace  of  Fleix. 


230  THE   CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.         [BOOK  IV. 

Henry  III.  had  no  child.  His  brother,  the  Duke  of  Alen- 
£on,  died  in  1584,  and  the  chief  of  the  Protestants,  Henry  of 
Navarre,  found  himself  heir  presumptive  to  the  crown.  The 
Catholics,  that  is  to  say,  the  majority  of  the  population  of  the 
country,  saw  themselves  menaced  with  having  a  Calvinist 
as  king.  Thus  the  league  was  reanimated  with  the  most 
intense  ardor. 

Henry  of  Guise  saw  well  that  the  moment  for  striking  heavy 
blows  was  come;  and  without  hesitating  he  signed  (December 
31,  1584)  with  Philip  II.  the  treaty  of  Joinville,  by  which 
the  contracting  parties  agreed  "to  extirpate  sects  and  here- 
sies, to  exclude  from  the  throne  of  France  heretical  princes, 
and  to  secure  the  succession  of  the  Valois  to  Charles,  Cardinal 
of  Bourbon."  This  Charles  of  Bourbon,  an  old  man  with- 
out a  child,  was  put  forward  to  conceal  the  pretensions  of 
the  Guises  until  they  could  show  them  openly.  Already 
through  the  provinces  circulated  new  genealogies  which  con- 
nected the  Guises  with  Charlemagne,  and  thus  was  assigned 
them  a  right  superior  to  that  of  the  Valois.  Pope  Sixtus  V. 
declared  the  two  Bourbons,  Henry  and  Conde,  fallen  from 
their  rights  as  princes  of  the  blood  and  unworthy  of  succeed- 
ing to  the  crown.  Parliament  protested  in  vain  in  memo- 
rable remonstrances  against  this  violence  done  to  conscience, 
"which  is  exempt  from  the  power  of  fire  and  sword,"  and 
against  the  bull  of  the  Pope,  which  it  called  an  attack  upon 
the  independence  of  the  crown. 

Then  commenced  the  war  of  the  three  Henries — Henry  of 
Navarre,  Henry  of  France,  and  Henry  of  Guise  (1586-89). 
The  first  led  off  by  a  great  victory,  the  only  one  the  Hugue- 
nots had  so  far  gained  in  pitched  battle.  The  royal  army 
was  almost  entirely  destroyed  at  Coutras,  and  its  chief, 
Joyeuse,  one  of  the  favorites  of  the  king,  was  slain  (1587). 
But  at  the  north  an  army  that  the  Reformed  princes  of  Ger- 
many were  sending  to  the  assistance  of  their  French  co- 
religionists was  vanquished  by  the  Duke  of  Guise  at  Vimory 
and  at  Auneau.  Henry  III.,  twice  beaten,  both  by  the 
defeat  of  his  favorite  and  by  the  successes  of  his  rival, 
endeavored  to  intimidate  the  Parisian  populace,  which  was 
entirely  devoted  to  the  league  and  the  duke;  it  replied 
to  him  by  an  insurrection.  The  city  was  covered  with  bar- 
ricades. The  few  thousand  Swiss  whom  he  had  about  him 
were  surrounded  and  disarmed.  He  himself  only  escaped 
with  great  difficulty  from  the  city.  At  the  moment  when 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIO US  WARS  (1559-98).  231 

Guise  entered  Paris  in  triumph  (March,  1588)  the  Great 
Armada  quitted  the  shores  of  Spain.  Everything  seemed  to 
promise  to  Philip  II.  and  to  Roman  Catholicism  a  speedy 
and  brilliant  victory.  But  in  July  the  English  and  the 
tempest  destroyed  the  Armada.  Henry  III.  again  began  to 
hope.  He  made  himself  humble  and  gentle  toward  his 
enemies,  granted  all  their  demands,  appointed  the  Duke  of 
Guise  lieutenant  general  of  the  kingdom,  promised  to  wage 
relentless  war  against  the  Huguenots,  and  convoked  the 
States  at  Blois.  When  he  had  by  these  means  enticed  the 
duke  into  that  city  he  had  him  assassinated  (December  23). 
The  following  day  the  Cardinal  of  Lorraine  was  killed  by 
halberds. 

But  Guise  obtained  his  strength  from  the  league  and  not 
the  league  from  him.  At  the  news  of  the  murder  the 
Parisians  rose;  the  Duke  of  Mayenne,  brother  of  the  victim, 
was  named  lieutenant  general  of  the  kingdom;  the  largest 
cities  declared  for  the  movement;  and  the  king,  abandoned 
by  all,  was  reduced  to  throwing  himself  into  the  arms  of  the 
King  of  Navarre.  Henry  of  Bourbon  with  joy  concluded 
an  alliance  which  gave  his  cause  legality.  The  two  kings 
besieged  Paris  with  40,000  men;  but  Henry  III.  was 
stabbed  to  death  by  the  Jacobin  friar  Jacques  Clement 

(1589)- 

The  King  of  Navarre  was  at  once  proclaimed  King  of 
France,  but  many  Catholics  and  even  Protestants  forsook 
him.  He  was  obliged  to  raise  the  siege  of  Paris  and  hasten 
to  Dieppe  to  meet  the  re-enforcements  which  Elizabeth  was 
sending  him.  The  battles  of  Arques  restored  his  fortune 
and  his  renown,  which  the  victory  of  Ivry  consecrated 
(1590).  Paris  was  anew  besieged,  and  this  time  would  have 
been  taken  if  Philip  had  not  decided  upon  an  active  inter- 
vention. 

Braved  even  upon  the  coasts  of  Spain  by  the  English  ships 
which  came  to  insult  Cadiz  and  Lisbon  and  to  carry  off  his 
American  galleons,  he  was  still  carrying  on  a  tedious  war  in 
the  Netherlands  against  the  skillful  Maurice  of  Nassau,  son 
of  his  great  victim  the  Silent.  In  1590  he  was  even  menaced 
with  the  loss  of  his  Walloon  provinces.  However,  he  ordered 
his  general,  Alexander  Farnese,  at  all  hazards  to  succor 
the  Parisians.  Leaving  Valenciennes  August  4,  the  duke 
reached  Meaux  on  the  23d — most  opportunely,  for  the  siege 
had  lasted  four  months.  "Two  days  more  and  the  people 


232  THE   CA  THOLIC  RESTOKA  TION.         [BOOK  IV. 

of  Paris,"  says  an  account,  "would  have  been  obliged  to 
open  their  gates."  Henry  marched  against  the  Spaniards 
to  give  them  battle  in  the  plains  of  Chelles.  The  Duke  of 
Parma,  a  skillful  tactician,  skirmished  with  the  French,  kept 
them  busy  for  four  days,  and  on  the  fifth,  under  cover  of  a 
thick  fog,  surprised  Lagny  on  the  Marne,  whence  he  dis- 
patched a  flotilla  of  boats  with  soldiers  and  provisions  to 
revictual  Paris.  All  the  labor  of  a  toilsome  campaign  was 
lost. 

If  the  Spanish  and  Italian  Catholics  supported  the  mem- 
bers of  the  league  the  Protestants  did  not  abandon  Henry 
IV.  There  came  to  him  7000  English  and  2000  Dutch, 
and  the  Viscount  of  Turenne  brought  him  12,000  Germans. 
France  was  the  battlefield  of  the  two  religions. 

The  campaign  of  1591  was,  however,  by  no  means  decisive. 
Henry  captured  Chartres,  one  of  the  granaries  of  Paris  (April 
19),  and  in  November,  in  order  to  control  Normandy  and 
the  lower  Seine,  endeavored  to  take  possession  of  Rouen. 
Farnese  came  again  to  deprive  him  of  a  certain  conquest, 
but  at  the  capture  of  Caudebec  he  received  a  severe  wound, 
and  while  he  was  on  his  bed  of  suffering  Henry  IV.  attacked 
his  army  at  Yvetot,  slew  3000  of  his  men,  and  shut  him  up 
in  a  desperate  position  between  the  Seine  and  the  sea. 
The  Duke  of  Parma  extricated  himself  from  this  difficulty, 
however,  and  crossed  the  river,  but  died  while  march- 
ing toward  the  Netherlands.  Henry  found  himself  delivered 
from  his  most  formidable  adversary. 

Meanwhile  the  league  was  full  of  divisions,  inevitable 
consequence  of  reverses.  The  Sixteen*  avenged  themselves 
for  Arques  and  Ivry  upon  the  moderate  Catholics,  and  sent 
the  president  of  the  Parliament,  Brisson,  to  the  gibbet  (No- 
vember, 1591).  Mayenne,  alarmed,  proscribed  the  chiefs 
of  the  popular  movement,  had  four  of  the  Sixteen  seized  and 
beheaded,  dissolved  their  council,  and  confided  the  munic- 
ipal functions  to  declared  "Prudents"  (February,  1592). 
Thereby  he  suppressed  the  turbulent  faction,  but  also  the 
most  energetic  of  the  party.  Afterward  an  underhand  oppo- 
sition, secretly  encouraged  by  Spain,  trammeled  the  projects 
of  Mayenne.  However,  the  public  cry  demanded  a  definitive 

*  The  Sixteen  was  the  name  given  to  a  faction  formed  at  Paris  during 
the  predominance  of  the  league,  and  so  called  because  sixteen  of  its 
principal  members  had  been  appointed  heads  of  the  sixteen  sections  of 
the  capital. — ED. 


CHAP.  XV.]         THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  (1559-98).  233 

power.  Mayenne  convoked  a  phantom  of  the  States  General. 
The  deputies  met  at  Paris  (January,  1593).  Then  appeared 
in  the  broad  day  the  rival  ambitions:  Mayenne,  the  young 
Duke  of  Guise,  son  of  the  Well  Scarred,  and  Philip  II.  each 
wished  the  crown.  The  last  sought  it  ostensibly  for  his 
daughter  Isabella.  "What  husband,"  said  a  deputy,  "does 
King  Philip  design  for  his  daughter?"  They  expected  the 
name  of  the  Duke  of  Guise.  "The  Archduke  Ernest  of 
Austria, "  replied  the  Spanish  ambassador.  There  was  an 
explosion  of  murmurs.  The  archduke  vainly  endeavored  to 
repair  this  error  by  offering  to  give  the  young  Duke  of  Guise 
as  husband  to  the  princess.  It  was  too  late;  Parliament 
intervened  and  passed  a  decree  against  the  pretensions  of  the 
King  of  Spain.  Mayenne  was  therein  entreated  "to  prevent 
the  crown  under  pretext  of  religion  from  being  transferred 
to  foreign  hands." 

Thus  after  thirty  years  of  wars  the  Catholics  and  the  Prot- 
estants had  equally  reached  the  most  evident  impotence. 
Neither  the  one  party  nor  the  other,  no  more  the  league 
despite  the  gold  and  the  soldiers  of  Philip  II.  than  the  King 
of  Navarre  despite  the  glory  of  Coutras,  Arques,  and  Ivry, 
was  able  to  fashion  a  national  government.  France  repulsed 
the  members  of  the  league  as  instruments  and  accomplices  of 
the  foreigner,  Henry  IV.  as  a  heretic.  There  was  only  one  way 
of  finishing,  and  it  was  necessary  to  make  haste,  for  the  king- 
dom was  falling  into  dissolution:  the  King  of  Navarre  must 
sacrifice  his  creed  to  the  nation  since  it  was  not  willing  to 
sacrifice  to  him  its  own.  The  conversion  of  Henry  was 
necessary.  The  Pope  himself,  Sixtus  V.,  had  indicated  it 
as  the  only  possible  solution  of  the  inextricable  crisis  in 
which  Europe  and  France  were  found.  "If  the  King  of 
Navarre  were  present,"  he  had  said,  "I  would  entreat  him 
on  my  knees  to  become  a  Catholic." 

It  cost  much  to  the  son  of  Jeanne  d'Albret,  to  the  pupil 
of  Coligny,  to  break  with  those  Huguenots  "who  .had  car- 
ried him  upon  their  shoulders  on  this  side  of  the  river 
Loire."  But  it  was  the  advice  even  of  the  wisest  among 
them.  July  25  he  renounced  Protestantism  at  St.  Denis.* 

*  St.  Denis,  of  constant  mention  in  French  history,  is  a  cathedral  in  a 
town  of  the  same  name,  seven  kilometers  from  Paris.  From  the  time  of 
King  Dagobert  (died  638)  it  was  the  royal  mausoleum,  almost  all  the 
French  kings  with  their  families  being  there  interred.  During  the  French 
Revolution  the  Convention,  under  the  plea  that  the  nation  needed  cannon 


234  THE   CATHOLIC  RESTORATION. 

The  league  had  no  longer  reason  to  exist.  It  delayed 
but  could  not  prevent  the  triumph  of  the  Bearnese.  Brissac 
surrendered  Paris  to  him  March  12,  1594,  and  the  following 
year  (September,  1595)  he  received  the  pontifical  absolution. 
The  members  of  the  league  could  not  be  more  exacting  than 
the  Pope.  The  Duke  of  Guise  had  already  yielded  (Novem- 
ber, 1593) ;  Mayenne  made  his  submission  at  the  beginning 
of  1596.  But  all  also  like  Brissac  set  a  high  price  on  their 
obedience.  A  short  war  with  Spain,  marked  by  the  combat 
of  Fontaine  Francaise  (1595)  and  the  recapture  of  Amiens 
(1597),  brought  about  the  peace  of  Vervins.  The  boundaries 
of  the  two  kingdoms  were  re-established  upon  the  footing  of 
the  treaty  of  Cateau-Cambresis  (May,  1598).  Three  weeks 
previously  Henry  had  consolidated  internal  peace  by  the  edict 
of  Nantes  (April,  1598).  Drawn  up  upon  the  basis  of  the 
edict  of  Bergerac,  the  edict  of  Nantes  guaranteed  to  the 
Protestants  liberty  of  conscience  everywhere;  liberty  of  wor- 
ship in  the  interior  of  their  castles  and  in  a  great  number 
of  cities;  mixed  Chambers  in  Parliament  to  judge  the  suits 
of  Protestants  against  Catholics;  places  of  surety;  finally, 
that  which  constituted  them,  as  it  were,  a  state  within  a  state, 
the  right  of  assembly  by  deputies  every  three  years  in 
order  to  present  to  the  government  their  complaints. 

and  munitions,  and  that  these  tombs  could  furnish  bronze  and  lead,  voted 
their  demolition.  The  royal  ashes  were  thrown  into  a  common  pit. 
After  the  restoration  Louis  XVIII.  had  these  ashes  replaced  in  the 
crypt,  where  he  was  also  himself  buried  in  1821. — ED. 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  RELIGIOUS  WARS  IN  FRANCE, 
SPAIN,  ENGLAND,  AND  HOLLAND. 


Decline    and  Ruin  of  Spain. — Prosperity   of   England  and  Holland.- 
Reorganization  of  France  by  Henry  IV.  (1598-1610). 


WHEN  Philip  II.  died  four  months  after  the  treaty  of 
Vervins  and  the  edict  of  Nantes,  he  had  not  only  beheld  the 
miscarriage  of  his  ambitious  designs  upon 
ru?n  of  spatnd  Western  Europe;  he  had  also  been  able  to  con- 
template the  ruin  of  his  hereditary  states. 
The  demon  of  the  south  had  been  as  deadly  to  his  friends 
as  to  his  foes.  He  had  lost  half  the  Netherlands,  and  of 
the  three  crowns  which  he  had  wished  to  grasp  only  one 
remained  to  him,  already  stripped  of  its  fairest  jewels,  and 
Spain  herself  was  nothing  but  a  living  corpse. 

In  order  to  preserve  the  unity  of  the  grand  drama  of  the 
religious  wars  I  have  not  yet  spoken  of  facts  which,  despite 
their  importance,  are  only  episodical.  I  revert  to  them  here 
for  the  purpose  of  completing  the  picture  of  this  reign,  and 
of  showing  what  were  the  consequences  to  Spain  of  this 
insatiable  ambition.  There  is  not  in  history  a  greater 
moral  lesson. 

These  episodical  facts  are  the  conquest  of  Portugal,  the 
struggle  which  Philip  II.  sustained  against  the  Ottomans  on 
the  Mediterranean,  and  finally,  his  intrigues  to  dominate  the 
North  Sea  and  the  Baltic  by  taking  possession  of  Denmark. 

The  death  of  King  Don  Sebastian  at  Alcazarquivir  south 
of  Tangiers,  in  an  adventurous  expedition  in  Africa,  had  made 
the  crown  of  Portugal  pass  to  an  infirm  and  aged  man,  his 
uncle,  Cardinal  Don  Henry,  sixty-seven  years  old.  The  new 
king  died  in  1580.  The  natural  son  of  one  of  his  brothers, 
Don  Antonio,  Grand  Prior  of  Crato,  caused  himself  to  be  pro- 
claimed in  his  place:  but  Philip  II.  had  already  put  himself 


236  THE   CA  THOLIC  RESTORA  T10N.         [BOOK  IV. 

forth  as  heir  of  the  crown.  He  bought  the  nobility;  and 
the  Duke  of  Alva  entering  Portugal  with  30,000  men,  at 
Alcantara  defeated  Don  Antonio,  who  took  refuge  in  France. 
In  two  months  the  kingdom  was  conquered,  and  the  cortes 
of  Thomar  solemnly  recognized  Philip  II.  on  condition  that 
Portugal  should  remain  a  separate  and  independent  kingdom 
with  its  own  tribunals  and  its  capital  (September  2,  1580) 
All  the  peninsula  found  itself  reunited  under  his  laws,  and 
moreover,  the  East  Indies  and  the  Portuguese  colonies;  that 
is  to  say,  Brazil  in  America;  Guinea,  Angola,  Benguela,  the 
coasts  of  Zanzibar,  of  Quiloa,  of  Mozambique,  and  the  island 
of  Socotora  in  Africa;  Ormuz,  the  kingdoms  of  Cambay 
and  of  Diu,  Malabar,  Ceylon,  Malacca,  and  Macao  in  Asia; 
the  Moluccas  in  Oceanica. 

What  a  future  of  prosperity  and  greatness  opened  for 
Spain  if,  quitting  Madrid,  that  capital  without  water,  without 
outlets,  which  was  then  hardly  a  city,  Philip  II.  had  estab- 
lished the  seat  of  his  government  at  Lisbon  on  the  largest 
stream  of  the  peninsula?  Lisbon  was  the  real  center  of  the 
vast  colonial  empire  of  the  Spaniards.  If  the  Castilian  king 
in  these  circumstances  misunderstood  the  interests  of  his 
greatness  he  was  perhaps  forced  to  do. so  by  his  prejudices 
and  by  those  of  his  people;  but  he  appeared  less  the  king 
than  the  scourge  of  Portugal.  Despite  an  amnesty  he 
poured  out  rivers  of  blood;  2000  priests  or  monks  it  is  said 
perished  by  his  orders.  All  positions  were  sold,  the  richest 
benefices  given  to  Spaniards,  the  former  domains  of  the 
crown  alienated,  the  nobility  thrust  aside  from  public 
positions  and  relegated  to  their  lands.  In  eighteen  years 
only  three  Portuguese  gentlemen  received  honorary  titles. 
All  was  reserved  to  the  Castilians. 

Moreover,  the  Spanish  ministers  seemed  systematically 
working  for  the  ruin  of  this  unhappy  country.  The  mo- 
nopoly of  American  commerce  was  reserved  to  the  Castilians 
alone,  while  the  burdens  imposed  on  Spain  were  also  laid 
upon  Portugal  with  one  exception,  that  of  military  service. 
The  Portuguese  were  rarely  employed,  because  their  fidelity 
was  suspected  and  the  Castilians  almost  exclusively  fur- 
nished the  officers  of  the  army,  and  it  was  they  who  were 
exhausted  in  defending  the  Portuguese  possessions  against 
the  attacks  of  the  English  and  Dutch.  At  his  death  Philip 
II.  still  possessed  Portugal,  but  the  national  sentiment 
which  he  had  so  violently  outraged  was  only  waiting  for 


CHAP.  XVI.]      CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE   WARS,  237 

an  opportunity  to  burst  forth.  The  rupture  was  to  take 
place  in  1640. 

If,  therefore,  happy  circumstances  had  given  a  kingdom  to 
Philip  II.,  and  had  permitted  him  to  solve  the  great  problem 
of  unity  in  the  peninsula,  he  had  imperiled  everything  by 
his  unjust  and  incapable  administration,  while  the  obliga- 
tion to  defend  the  Portuguese  colonies  contributed  to  exhaust 
the  Castilian  population,  and  the  possibility  of  attacking  those 
possessions  created  the  maritime  fortune  of  the  Dutch. 

In  the  Mediterranean  he  possessed  Naples,  Sicily,  Sar- 
dinia, and  the  Balearic  Isles,  and  was  protector  of  the  Knights 
of  Malta.  He  could  therefore  easily  dominate  that  sea,  and 
he  had  the  duty  of  there  acting  as  police  for  European  com- 
merce. In  1558,  after  the  battle  of  St.  Quentin,  Souleiman 
I.,  the  old  ally  of  Francis  I.,  had  made  a  diversion  useful  to 
France  by  sending  his  fleet  against  Italy  and  the  Balearic 
Isles,  which  it  ravaged.  Six  years  earlier  the  Ottomans, 
masters  of  Algeria  since  1517,  had  taken  away  Tripoli  from 
the  Knights  of  Malta, and  Dragout,  successor  of  Barbaroussa, 
every  year  sent  Jiis  corsairs  to  pillage  the  coasts  of  Spain. 
Philip  II.,  enraged,  ordered  an  expedition  by  sea  and  land  in 
1558  from  Oran  upon  Tlemcen;  sailors  and  soldiers  perished. 
A  great  expedition  sent  the  following  year  against  Tripoli, 
and  which  consisted  of  15,000  soldiers  on  200  vessels,  met 
with  frightful  disaster.  In  1563  the  fleet  of  Naples  was 
destroyed  by  a  storm;  and  two  years  later  Malta  was  sur- 
rounded by  an  immense  armament  carrying  40,000  soldiers, 
the  last  effort  of  Soulei'man.  He  wished  to  finish  his  reign  as 
he  had  begun  it  by  a  grand  success  over  the  Christians.  He 
had  captured  Rhodes  from  the  knights  in  1526.  LaValetta, 
the  grand  master,  more  fortunate  than  Villiers  de  1'Isle 
Adam,  resisted  for  four  months  against  every  attack.  If 
Malta  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  Ottomans  the  Mediterranean 
would  belong  to  them;  but  they  could  not  secure  possession 
of  it.  They  revenged  themselves  in  1570  by  seizing  Cyprus 
from  the  Venetians  and  Tunis  from  the  Spaniards. 

Christendom  this  time  was  excited.  A  coalition  was 
formed  between  Venice,  the  Pope,  and  the  King  of  Spain. 
More  than  300  ships  carrrying  80,000  soldiers  and  rowers 
were  got  together.  The  commander  was  Don  Juan,  natural 
brother  of  Philip  II.,  who  had  just  won  distinction  by  repress- 
ing a  revolt  of  the  Moors  in  the  Alpujarras.  He  met  the 
Ottoman  fleet  in  the  Gulf  of  Lepanto,  and  inflicted  upon  it 


238  THE   CA  THOLIC  RESTORA  TION,         [BOOK  IV. 

a  terrible  disaster.  Thirty  thousand  Ottomans  were  slain 
or  made  prisoners,  170  galleys  were  captured,  80  destroyed, 
and  barely  40  escaped.  The  celebrated  author  Cervantes, 
who  took  part  in  the  battle,  lost  an  arm.  Thirteen  thousand 
Christians  were  restored  to  liberty. 

When  Pope  Pius  V.  heard  of  this  victory  he  intoned  the 
famous  verse,  "There  was  a  man  sent  from  God  whose  name 
was  John."  Christendom  was  waiting;  all  Greece  was  agi- 
tated, hoping  for  its  deliverance,  and  the  sultan  feared  for 
Constantinople;  but  Philip  II.  hindered  his  brother  from 
making  himself  King  of  Albania  and  Macedonia,  and  the 
immense  victory  had  only  trivial  results.  "Allah,"  cried 
Selim  when  learning  of  his  defeat,  "has  given  the  sea  to  the 
Giaours."  But  to  the  ambassador  of  Venice  he  said, 
"When  we  take  from  you  a  kingdom  we  tear  from  you  an 
arm;  when  you  disperse  our  fleet  you  simply  cut  our 
beard,  and  do  not  hinder  its  growing  out  again."  In  fact 
almost  immediately  he  armed  250  ships,  and  affrighted 
Venice  hastened  to  treat.  Philip  himself  in  1578  signed 
with  Mourad  III.  a  truce  which  lasted  as  long  as  his 
reign.  Tripoli,  Tunis,  and  Algiers  were  left  to  the  Otto- 
mans, who  by  their  discipline  and  courageous  spirit  acquired 
over  that  population  of  covetous  Moors  and  disorganized 
Arabs  an  ascendency  which  still  lasts  wherever  France  has 
not  replaced  them.  But  they  organized  in  the  three  states  a 
regular  brigandage  which  depopulated  the  coasts  of  Sicily, 
Italy,  and  Spain,  and  which  even  imposed  on  the  European 
states  the  shameful  obligation  of  paying  a  tribute  to  these 
pirates  in  order  to  obtain  some  security  for  their  commerce. 
Here  also  Philip  II.  had  completely  failed,  because,  pursu- 
ing so  many  different  ends,  he  scattered  his  force  upon  all 
the  roads  leading  thither  instead  of  concentrating  them 
upon  one. 

He  was  not  more  successful  in  Sweden  and  Denmark. 
Charles  V.  had  made  Christian  II.  of  Denmark  his  brother- 
in-law  and  ally,  and  had  aided  him  so  as  to  secure  a  support 
in  the  north  on  the  rear  of  the  Saxon  and  Hessian  Protes- 
tants. To  an  offer  of  Christian  II.  to  place  his  three  states 
under  the  suzerainty  of  the  empire  he  had  even  replied  by 
demanding  that  he  should  recognize  the  suzerainty  of  the 
house  of  Austria,  so  that  if  the  children  of  the  king  left 
no  heir  the  house  of  Austria  would  succeed  to  the  three 
northern  crowns. 


CHAP.  XVI.]      CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE   WARS.  239 

Philip  followed  the  same  plan  without  having  the  same 
reason  for  thus  spending  his  resources,  since  Germany  did 
not  belong  to  him.  In  1564  he  sent  subsidies  to  Eric  XIV., 
successor  of  Gustavus  Vasa,  to  aid  in  continuing  the  war 
against  the  Danish  king  Frederick  II.,  whom  he  wished  to 
overturn  to  the  profit  of  the  Catholic  Duchess  of  Lorraine, 
his  kinswoman.  This  plan  did  not  succeed.  But  Eric  XIV. 
having  been  dethroned  in  1568  by  his  brother  John  III.,  the 
docile  husband  of  the  Catholic  Catherine  Jagellon,  Philip 
II.  directed  his  batteries  thither.  He  pressed  the  new  king 
to  lead  back  his  people  to  the  bosom  of  the  Roman  Church, 
made  him  send  deputies  to  the  Pope,  proscribe  the  books  of 
Luther,  and  call  Jesuits,  to  whom  all  the  pulpits  were  com- 
mitted. Then  behind  religious  interest  political  interest 
appeared.  Philip  II.  formed  a  league  with  the  kings  of 
Sweden  and  Poland.  They  proposed  the  partition  of  Den- 
mark. The  King  of  Spain  was  to  have  as  his  share  the  Sound, 
Zealand  with  Copenhagen,  Fionia,  and  Jutland.  But  Cath- 
erine Jagellon  died  (1583);  with  her  the  Catholic  influence 
fell;  the  Jesuits  were  driven  out,  and  the  projects  of  Philip 
II.  on  the  Baltic  came  to  nothing. 

The  son  of  Charles  V.  could  then  have  abdicated  like  his 
father,  and  in  the  recesses  of  a  cloister  have  gone  to  hide  like 
him  the  ruin  of  his  hopes.  Charles  at  least  had  fought  for 
a  cause  in  certain  respects  legitimate.  He  had  broken  in 
Italy  the  French  preponderance,  injurious  for  France  as  it 
was  for  him,  and  above  all  for  Italy  itself.  He  had  arrested 
the  ascending  tide  of  Ottoman  domination,  and  had  endeav- 
ored to  make  of  Germany  a  nation  by  giving  it  unity  and 
peace.  If  the  means  which  he  employed  were  disastrous — 
license  to  the  soldiery,ruinous  extortions,  hindrances  of  every 
sort  to  manufactures  and  commerce — he  at  least  pursued 
designs  truly  great,  and  nobly  descended  from  the  throne  so 
as  not  to  wear  out  his  peoples  in  an  impossible  task.  His 
son,  on  the  contrary,  persisted  obstinately  and  died  a  king, 
but  king  of  a  lost  nation. 

Charles  V.  had  found  a  fulcrum  everywhere,  in  Spain, 
in  Italy,  in  the  empire,  and  in  the  Netherlands,  so  that 
none  of  his  peoples  bore  alone  the  weight  of  all  his  enter- 
prises. Philip  II.  demanded  almost  everything  of  Spain, 
and  drained  it  of  men,  money,  and  liberty. 

Aragon  had  preserved  a  few  privileges:  he  wrested  them 
from  it  on  the  occasion  of  the  trial  of  Antonio  Perez.  In 


240  THE   CA  l^HOLfC  RESTORA  TION.          [BOOK  IV. 

all  the  peninsula  the  Basque,  provinces  alone  preserved  their 
fueros. 

Heresy  seemed  to  him  as  much  a  rebellion  against  the  king 
as  against  Heaven:  he  allowed  free  scope  to  the  ferocious 
zeal  of  the  Inquisition,  and  charged  it  with  the  extirpation 
of  even  the  least  germ  of  the  pernicious  seed. 

To  secure  religious  unity  he  violently  persecuted  the 
Moors  of  the  ancient  kingdom  of  Granada,  and  persecution 
begot  revolt.  Under  Ferdinand  the  Catholic  the  Moors 
had  been  compelled  in  violation  of  the  treaty  of  Granada  to 
renounce  their  faith:  Philip  II.  in  1568  had  obliged  them  to 
change  their  names  and  to  abandon  the  language  and  dress  of 
their  ancestors.  They  were  forbidden  to  quit  their  residence 
without  the  permission  of  a  magistrate,  or  to  possess  a 
weapon,  or  even  a  ferrule  upon  a  cane.  A  general  insur- 
rection broke  out  the  same  day;  fires  lighted  upon  heights 
transmitted  from  mountain  to  mountain  the  signal  of  inde- 
pendence; the  women  even  armed  themselves  with  long 
packing  needles  to  pierce  the  bellies  of  the  horses.  In- 
trenched in  the  gorges  of  the  Alpujarras  the  Moors  could 
have  long  held  out  if  they  had  been  succored  by  their 
brethren  of  Tunis  and  Algiers.  But  Sultan  Selim  left  them 
unaided.  The  Spanish  infantry  and  its  chief,  the  heroic 
Don  Juan  of  Austria,  made  light  work  of  those  undis- 
ciplined and  poorly  armed  bands.  The  Moors  submitted. 
Philip  II.  had  them  transported  to  Castile.  All  above  ten 
years  old  became  slaves  (1569-70).  This  was  not  the  way 
to  restore  life  to  the  peninsula. 

There  everything  was  decaying;  the  activity  of  the  govern- 
ment, absorbed  by  the  vast  cares  of  the  universal  war  under- 
taken against  heresy,  no  longer  paid  attention  to  the  develop- 
ment of  national  wealth.  Commerce  and  manufactures, 
cruelly  injured  by  the  expulsion  of  the  Jews  and  the  revolt  of 
the  Moors,  suffered  still  more  from  the  monopoly  which  the 
government  had  established.  Of  all  the  importations  into 
America  Spanish  manufactures  furnished  hardly  a  tenth;, 
smuggled  goods  made  up  the  rest.  The  thousands  of  looms 
which  formerly  at  Seville  wove  the  wool  and  silk  were 
reduced  to  a  few  hundreds.  Agriculture  succumbed  under 
the  periodical  ravages  of  flocks  of  the  mesta,  which  in  winter 
descended  into  the  warm  plains  of  Andalusia  and  in  summer 
ascended  toward  the  mountains  of  Galicia,  devouring  every- 
thing in  their  way.  The  population,  decimated  by  contin- 


CHAP.  XVI.]     COMSEQU&NCES  OF  THE  WARS.  241 

uous  wars,  by  emigration  to  the  colonies,  was  also  impov- 
erished in  its  source  by  the  excessive  multiplication  of 
monasteries.  Nearly  a  million  ecclesiastics  were  reckoned 
in  the  states  of  Philip  II. 

Some  seeking  fortune  beyond  the  seas,  others  encounter- 
ing the  adventures  of  a  soldier's  life  or  asking  from  the 
monasteries  peaceful  idleness,  the  national  labor  was,  as  it 
were,  suspended.  Spain  ceased  to  produce  what  was  neces- 
sary to  herself,  and  was  obliged  to  demand  it  from  neighbor- 
ing nations.  In  vain  the  galleons  from  America  which  had 
escaped  the  English  cruisers  reached  Cadiz.  The  gold 
which  they  brought  only  traversed  Spain  without  fertilizing 
it,  and  flowed  rapidly  away  toward  productive  countries. 
Thus  is  explained  the  fact  which  so  surprised  his  contem- 
poraries that  the  King  of  Spain,  the  master  of  both  Indies, 
the  possessor  of  the  richest  metallic  deposits  in  the  world, 
twice  saw  himself  obliged  like  an  insolvent  merchant  to  sus- 
pend payment,  and  left  at  his  death  a  debt  of  more  than 
200,000,000  dollars.  It  was  not  yet  known  that  true  wealth 
is  not  the  gold  which  represents  it  but  the  toil  which  creates  it. 

Philip  II.  died  in  1598  of  that  hideous  disease  phthiri- 
asis.  He  left  behind  him  one  of  the  most  terrible  examples 
of  the  fatal  influence  of  despotism  upon  the  life  of  nations.  A 
century  later  the  Marquis  de  Torcy  said  of  Spain:  "It  is  a 
soulless  body."  Philip  had  made  of  her,  as  we  already 
said,  a  living  corpse.  To-day  this  corpse  is  becoming  re- 
animate, but  so  profound  had  been  the  deadly  influence  that 
respectable  people  were  there,  as  recently  as  1862,  con- 
demned to  the  galleys  for  having  read  a  Protestant  Bible. 

England  had  just  passed  through  a  terrible  crisis.  But 
the  menaces  of  Philip  II.  and  the  plots  of  the  Catholics  re- 
Pros  erit  of  su^te(^  m  exalting  English  patriotism,  the 
England  and  popularity  and  power  of  the  queen,  and  in  fine 
the  ardor  of  the  Anglican  faith.  As  England 
came  forth  victorious  from  the  struggle  she  found  herself 
raised  in  the  opinion  of  her  children  and  of  Europe  by  all 
the  height  which  Spain  descended.  To  ward  off  her  perils 
a  dictatorship  had  been  necessary;  it  existed  after  the  danger 
was  averted, and  the  royal  authority  remained  so  absolute  that 
the  historian  Hume  could  say  that  the  English  government 
resembled  an  Oriental  despotism.  It  resembled  it  by  its 
force  and,  moreover,  by  its  acts.  Elizabeth  persecuted  not 
only  the  Catholics  but  also  the  Non-conformists,  Puritans  or 


242  THE    CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.          [BOOK  IV. 

Independents,  who,  going  beyond  the  point  where  the  queen 
desired  to  arrest  the  Reform, rejected  the  episcopal  hierarchy, 
the  jurisdiction  of  ecclesiastical  courts,  and  the  ceremonies 
of  the  faith.  Against  them  all,  that  is,  against  the  sanctuary 
of  conscience,  which  must  always  remain  free,  Elizabeth 
promulgated  an  appalling  mass  of  laws  which  form  an  odious 
code,  and  were  justified  by  the  threadbare  excuse  of  every 
tyranny — political  necessity.  And  what  was  the  result  of 
this  arbitrariness  and  of  these  violences?  Read  the  follow- 
ing testimony  of  a  Protestant :  "The  Church  was  not  left  by 
Elizabeth  in  a  situation  which  could  demand  praises  for  the 
policy  of  its  chiefs.  After  forty  years  of  persecutions  con- 
stantly aggravated  against  the  Non-conformists  their  numbers 
had  increased,  their  popularity  had  become  unquestioned, 
their  hostility  to  the  established  order  was  more  irrecon- 
cilable." A  revolution  existed  in  the  germ;  the  second 
successor  of  Elizabeth  was  to  behold  it  accomplished 
against  himself. 

This  religious  tyranny  served  political  despotism ;  for  to 
better  attack  the  Catholics,  their  common  adversaries,  the 
fanatics  of  both  parties,  Anglican  and  Puritan,  allowed  full 
latitude  to  the  crown  in  violating  the  laws.  The  Star 
Chamber  cited  before  it  the  jurors  when  they  had  acquitted 
some  accused  person  whom  the  court  wished  to  destroy,  and 
condemned  those  jurors  to  enormous  fines  or  to  prison  with- 
out fixed  period;  hence  trial  by  jury,  the  most  precious  of 
English  guarantees,  no  longer  existed.  So  the  writer  whom 
we  quoted  a  little  while  ago  could  say  without  exceeding 
the  truth,  "In  the  trials  for  high  treason  our  courts  of  jus- 
tice differed  little  from  veritable  caverns  of  assassins. ' '  The 
Privy  Council,  sometimes  a  single  one  of  its  members,  in  its 
own  name  inflicted  arbitrary  imprisonments;  the  ministers 
employed  all  the  rigors  of  martial  law  without  discrimination, 
even  repressing  with  severity  petty  disturbances  caused  by 
a  few  noisy  apprentices. 

Though  the  jury  was  almost  suppressed,  Parliament  still 
existed.  Elizabeth  tolerated  no  remonstrance  on  its  part. 
In  1581  the  Commons  having  ordered  a.  fast  and  public 
prayers,  they  were  compelled  to  beg  pardon.  Whoever 
freely  raised  his  voice  in  either  House  was  cast  into  prison. 
Despite  her  luxury,  attested  by  the  3000  dresses  found  at 
her  death,  Elizabeth  elsewhere  ruled  with  an  economy  that 
often  dispensed  her  from  demanding  subsidies.  She  hus- 


CHAP.  XVI.]      CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE   WARS.  243 

banded  the  purse  of  her  subjects  to  the  great  profit  of  her 
power.  Let  us  add  that  at  times  she  knew  how  to  yield 
advantageously.  In  1601  she  had  conceded  a  number  of 
monopolies.  The  price  of  everything  rose;  a  formidable 
riot  began.  The  queen  withdrew  what  she  had  granted 
and  thanked  the  Commons  for  having  warned  her  in 
season. 

Besides,  posterity  forgets  Parliament  and  its  rights  when 
the  queen  appears  to  us  between  Shakspere  and  Bacon,  sur- 
rounded by  statesmen  like  Burleigh  and  mariners  like  Drake, 
Hawkins,  Frobisher,  Raleigh,  and  Davis.  Drake  was  the 
first  captain  who  circumnavigated  the  globe,  Magellan 
having  died  on  the  way,  and  the  first  to  double  Cape  Horn, 
of  which  he  should  be  considered  the  discoverer.  When  he 
reached  England  Elizabeth  went  on  board  his  vessel  to 
herself  dub  him  knight.  Hawkins,  relative  of  Drake,  is 
specially  celebrated  for  the  development  which  he  gave  to 
the  slave  traffic,  a  commerce  which  did  not  then  carry  with 
it  the  odium  justly  attached  to  it  since.  Frobisher  was  the 
first  English  sailor,  subsequent  to  Sebastian  Cabot,  who  in 
order  to  reach  China  sought  the  Northwest  Passage,  which 
has  just  been  discovered  after  three  centuries  of  effort  and 
heroism.  Davis  discovered  the  strait  which  bears  his  name. 
Gilbert  planted  some  colonists  in  Newfoundland.  Raleigh 
led  others  to  that  part  of  North  America  to  which  in  honor 
of  the  virgin  queen  he  gave  the  name  of  Virginia,  and 
imported  into  England  the  potato,  assuredly  the  most 
precious  of  all  his  discoveries.  He  also  was  the  first  to 
transplant  the  cherry  to  Ireland.  The  colonists  whom  he 
had  left  in  Virginia  adopted  the  habit  of  smoking,  which 
from  there  passed  over  to  England. 

Manufactures  under  Elizabeth  made  prodigious  progress. 
Numerous  Flemish  emigrants,  fleeing  the  Spanish  yoke, 
established  themselves  at  various  points  of  the  English  terri- 
tory, especially  in  Lancashire,  married  there,  and  placing 
their  industry  at  the  service  of  the  country  where  they  had 
found  an  asylum,  increased  the  already  considerable  activity 
in  woolen  manufactures.  Also  Flemings  at  the  same  period 
replaced  the  humble  stalls  in  London,  where  till  then  had 
been  sold  only  pottery  and  brushes,  by  vast  magazines 
where  were  displayed  the  products  of  all  the  world.  Let 
us  not  forget  that  Elizabeth  in  person  inaugurated  (January 
25,  1571)  the  Royal  Exchange  at  London,  founded  by  the 


244  THE    CA  THOLIC  RESTORA  TION.          [BOOK  IV. 

munificence  of  the  banker  Thomas  Gresham  when  the  pre- 
cious system  of  commercial  insurance  began. 

Elizabeth,  however,  ended  her  glorious  reign  in  sadness. 
The  presumptuous  Earl  of  Essex,  who  had  succeeded  the 
Earl  of  Leicester  in  her  affection,  finally  exhausted  the 
patience  of  the  queen  and  was  disgraced.  Because  he  had 
seen  the  court  at  his  feet  he  believed  himself  strong  enough 
to  expel  the  ministers,  and  (February  8,  1601)  he  appeared  in 
the  streets  of  London,  sword  in  hand,  followed  by  two  or 
three  hundred  partisans,  and  called  upon  the  people  to 
revolt.  The  people  did  not  stir.  The  earl  was  taken 
prisoner,  condemned  to  death,  and  as  he  obstinately  refused 
to  sue  for  pardon,  executed.  But  after  that  day  Elizabeth 
only  languished.  She  died  April  3,  1603,  aged  seventy 
years.  She  had  done  two  things  which  had  contributed 
much  to  the  greatness  of  England.  She  had  thrown  it  irrev- 
ocably into  the  ways  of  Protestantism  at  the  same  time  that 
she  had  shown  it  the  scepter  of  the  ocean  which  it  might 
seize;  by  recognizing  the  King  of  Scotland  as  her  successor 
she  had  hastened  the  union  of  that  country  with  England. 

Under  Elizabeth  lived  two  great  men  who  belong  rather 
to  humanity  than  to  their  native  land,  Shakspere  and  Bacon. 
Yet  no  poet  was  more  national  than  Shakspere:  he  is  the 
English  genius  personified  in  its  free  and  haughty  bearing, 
its  ruggedness,  its  depth,  and  its  melancholy.  The  literary 
creations  of  Shakspere  form  a  monument  unique  in  modern 
history.  Even  to-day  he  is  the  writer  whom  England  can 
oppose  with  pride  to  everything  admirable  which  ancients 
and  moderns  have  produced  in  dramatic  art.  Born  in  1564, 
he  died  in  1616  at  the  age  of  fifty-two.  His  principal  works 
are  "Othello,"  "Hamlet,"  "Macbeth,"  "King  Lear," 
"Richard  III.,"  "Romeo  and  Juliet,"  "The  Merchant 
ofVenice,"  "Csesar,"  and  "The  Tempest."  Far  below  him 
but  holding  an  honorable  rank  are  placed  Philip  Sidney,  a 
great  lord,  who  was  poet  and  diplomat;  Spenser,  author  of 
"The  Faerie  Queene;"  and  Ben  Jonson,  a  comic  poet  and 
satirist,  who  was  the  friend  of  Shakspere. 

Francis  Bacon,  born  in  1561,  is  one  of  the  founders  of 
modern  philosophy.  In  his  "De  Augmentis  Scientiarum," 
published  in  1623,  and  in  his" Novum  Organum,"  published 
in  1620,  he  opened  a  new  path  to  the  sciences,  freeing  them 
both  from  routine  and  venturesome  hypotheses  by  the  sub- 
stitution of  patient  observation  and  repeated  experiment. 


CHAP.  XVI.]      CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE   WARS.  245 

Unhappily  he  degraded  his  character  by  unbridled  cupidity. 
He  was  appointed  in  1619  Lord  High  Chancellor  of  England, 
and  later  this  man  of  transcendent  genius  was  sent  to  prison; 
condemned  for  peculation. 

The  republic  of  the  United  Provinces  had  neither  poet 
nor  philosopher;  she  had  not  yet  reached  that  luxury  of 
great  communities  which  have  become  settled  and  tranquil; 
but  the  terrible  struggle  she  had  just  endured  had  increased, 
not  crippled,  her  strength.  Her  soil,  half  submerged,  which 
nature  defends  so  well,  had  become  the  battlefield  of  reli- 
gious liberty  against  intolerance.  All  men  in  Europe  who 
fled  the  stake  or  persecution  flocked  under  the  flag  of  the 
United  Provinces.  Thus  its  army  was  always  full  without 
agriculture  and  the  marine  ever  lacking  the  necessary  hands. 
The  provinces  of  Holland  and  Zealand  alone  counted  70,000 
sailors.  While  Ostend  sustained  a  siege  of  thirty-nine 
months  (1601-04)  which  cost  the  life  of  60,000  confederates 
but  also  of  80,000  Spaniards,  the  Batavians  covered  the  sea 
with  their  ships.  During  the  very  year  in  which  the  heroic 
city  yielded  to  Spinola  its  crumbled  ramparts  the  fishermen 
poured  into  the  public  treasury  by  the  one  tax  imposed 
upon  their  industry  the  enormous  sum  of  5,000,000  florins; 
.and  a  Dutch  fleet  through  the  conquest  of  the  Moluccas 
laid  at  the  extremities  of  the  world  the  foundations  of  a  new 
colonial  empire. 

The  Dutch  being  able  to  obtain  almost  nothing  from 
their  soil  for  exportation,  became  ocean  carriers  and  harvest- 
ers of  the  sea.  Their  hardy  fishermen,  in  constant  pursuit  of 
the  booty  which  the  fruitful  waters  bestowed,  furnished  with 
salt  provisions  almost  all  Europe,  even  the  Catholic  coun- 
tries, where  weekly  abstinence  from  meat  made  them  a  neces- 
sity. It  was  a  truthful  saying  that  Holland  exchanged  her 
tons  of  herrings  for  tons  of  gold.  Besides,  her  merchants  did 
business  on  commission.  With  their  ships  they  went  to  take 
at  a  low  price  commodities  where  they  abounded  and  to 
carry  them  where  they  were  wanting.  Every  year  two  or 
three  thousand  Dutch  vessels  entered  the  French  harbors  to 
carry  away  French  grain,  wines,  and  brandy,  and  more  than 
400  under  a  foreign  flag  entered  even  the  ports  of  Spain, 
which  with  the  treasures  of  the  New  World  paid  those  rebels 
for  the  grain  of  Poland  and  the  northern  products  which 
Spain  lacked. 

Philip  II.  closed  Lisbon  to  them  in  1594,     In  the  follow- 


246  THE   CA  THOLIC  RESTORA  TION.         [BOOK  IV. 

ing  year  they  formed  the  Company  of  Distant  Countries,  in 
order  to  go  for  spices  to  the  very  place  of  production;  and 
the  rapid  success  of  this  society  brought  about  the  creation 
in  1602  of  the  great  East  India  Company,  which,  utilizing 
the  hatred  excited  by  the  Portuguese,  established  factories 
and  fortresses  at  Java,  Amboyna,  Tidor,  Formosa,  in  the 
island  of  Ceylon,  and  at  Malacca.  In  thirteen  years  it 
armed  800  ships  and  captured  from  the  enemy  545,  the  hulls 
and  cargoes  of  which  brought  in  180,000,000  livres.  The 
dividends  of  the  stockholders  were  never  less  than  twenty 
per  cent.,  and  sometimes  rose  to  fifty  per  cent.  Those  fair 
days  have  passed  away,  but  so  much  wealth  was  amassed  in 
the  hands  of  the  "Beggars'  "  descendants  that  Holland  still 
remains  one  of  the  countries  where  capital  most  abounds, 
and  Amsterdam  is  one  of  the  great  financial  markets  of  the 
world. 

Henry  had  paid  dearly  for  the  submission  of  the  chiefs 
of  the  league:  by  the  edict  of  Nantes  he  left  the  Protestants 

a  respectable  political  existence.  He  meant, 
tionCofg1^rance  however,  that  there  should  be  in  France  only 
by  Henry  iv.  one  will,  his  own.  On  coming  out  from  so 

terrible  wars  the  country  needed  repose,  order, 
and  security.  Henry  wished  to  give  it  these  conditions  of 
social  existence.  Leaguers  and  Protestants  wished  to  es- 
tablish the  working  of  society  only  by  a  party.  Above  all 
the  individual  passions  the  king  set  up  the  force  and  intelli- 
gence of  a  government  absolute  but  indifferent  to  the  animos- 
ities of  the  past  and  solicitous  for  national  interests  and 
greatness. 

The  financial  disorder  was  extreme.  The  public  debt  was 
estimated  at  345,000,000  francs,  or  about  1,300,000,000 
francs  money  of  to-day.  France  paid  annually  170,000,000 
francs,  without  reckoning  seignorial  dues  and  feudal  forced 
labor.  The  net  revenue  amounted  hardly  to  30,000,000 
francs,  from  which  19,000,000  francs  were  to  be  deducted 
to  meet  the  liabilities  of  the  state.  Almost  all  the 
royal  domain  was  alienated.  From  top  to  bottom  of  the 
financial  administration  through  all  the  degrees  there 
was  peculation.  The  state  did  not  know  exactly  what  it 
ought  to  receive,  nor  even  what  it  did  receive,  so  much  that 
was  paid  in  disappeared  on  the  way.  Henry  IV.  in 
1599  appointed  Sully,  one  of  his  old  companions  in  arms, 
superintendent  of  the  finances.  The  new  minister  wished 


CHAP.  XVI.]      CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE   WARS.  247 

to  make  himself  acquainted  with  everything.  A  chamber 
of  justice  prosecuted  unfaithful  agents;  the  collectors  were 
bound  to  keep  exact  accounts  with  confirmatory  proofs.  He 
forbade  the  governors  to  levy  arbitrary  imposts  upon  the 
provinces,  revised  all  the  credits,  annulled  many,  and  raised 
the  leases  of  the  public  farms.  Many  useless  offices,  fraudu- 
lent annuities,  and  illegal  immunities  were  suppressed  and 
others  diminished.  Many  people  who  had  conferred  nobility 
on  themselves  re-entered  the  class  of  the  tax  payers.  He- 
redity of  offices,  officially  constituted  in  1604  by  the  annual 
right  of  paulette,*  was  a  measure  less  honorable  than  the 
preceding,  but  it  aided  the  royal  treasury. 

To  exactitude  in  the  receipts  corresponded  a  wise  economy 
in  expenses.  So  at  the  close  of  the  reign  of  Henry  IV.  his 
government  had  paid  debts  amounting  to  147,000,000  francs, 
had  ransomed  domains  to  the  amount  of  80,000,000,  had 
extinguished  8,000,000  of  annuities,  and  had  reduced  the 
impost  from  30,000,000  to  26,000,000,  of  which  22,000,000 
entered  clear  into  the  treasury,  employed  40,000,000  in  for- 
tifications or  public  works,  made  secure  the  service  of  the 
current  year,  and  amassed  a  reserve  of  20,000,000. 

Economy  husbands  wealth  but  does  not  create  it.  Henry 
IV.  and  Sully  sought  it  from  agriculture,  commerce,  and 
manufactures.  Henry  devoted  his  attention  equally  to  these 
three  sources  of  public  fortune.  Sully  was  more  exclusively 
in  favor  of  agriculture.  "Cultivation  and  pasturage,"  wrote 
he  in  his  "Royal  Economies,"  "are  the  two  breasts  that 
nourish  the  state."  Twice  he  traversed  the  provinces  (1596, 
1598)  in  order  to  himself  study  the  needs  of  the  country,  and 
he  caused  the  passage  of  the  great  ordinance  of  1600  which 
absolved  the  people  from  arrears  of  taxes  amounting  to 
20,000,000,  and  reduced  the  land  tax  about  1,800,000  francs. 
In  1596  he  renewed  the  ancient  prohibition  against  seizing 
the  person  of  laborers,  their  tools  or  beasts  of  burden,  for 
public  or  private  debt;  severe  ordinances  decreed  the 
penalty  of  death  against  all  military  men  who  roamed  over  the 
country,  and  against  whoever  was  found  carrying  weapons 

*  The  dues  paid  annually  by  many  officers  of  justice  and  finance  to  the 
king  that  they  might  dispose  of  their  offices,  whose  revenue  was  to  descend 
to  their  heirs  should  they  die  before  the  expiration  of  the  year.  These 
dues  were  first  established  in  1604  by  the  secretary  of  the  king's  cham- 
ber, Paulet  (whence  the  name  paulette),  and  were  fixed  at  one-sixtieth  of 
the  current  value  of  the  office. — ED. 


248  THE   CA  THOLIC  RESTORA  TIOX.         [BOOK  IV. 

and  not  in  the  service  of  the  king  or  a  gentleman  At  last 
in  1601  Sully  permitted  the  export  of  grain,  a  bold  measure 
for  the  period,  and  yet  one  which  was  destined  to  enrich 
the  country  and  far  from  causing  famine.  He  favored  the 
drainage  of  the  marshes.  All  land  reclaimed  from  the 
water  became  noble,  that  is  to  say,  not  subject  to  taxation. 
Thus  was  formed  quite  a  canton  on  the  Medoc,  called  Little 
Flanders  because  of  the  large  number  of  Flemish  workmen 
who  were  charged  with  the  works  under  the  direction  of 
Bradley  of  Brabant,  the  master  of  the  dikes.  A  Protestant 
gentleman  of  Languedoc,  Olivier  de  Serre,  deserves  to  be 
called  father  of  French  agriculture  on  account  of  the 
maxims  which  he  gives  in  his  "Theater  of  Agriculture,"  and 
his  "Management  of  the  Fields,"  which  he  applied  himself  in 
a  sort  of  model  farm. 

Sully  said  like  Pliny  that  work  in  the  fields  makes  good 
soldiers — "Ex  agricultura  strenuissimi  milites."  The 
worthy  gentleman  feared  that  manufactures  would  render 
the  French  unaccustomed  to  active  life,  to  the  open  air  which 
bestows  strength  and  health,  and  that  by  living  shut  up  in 
manufacturing  establishments  the  population  would  degen- 
erate. He  was  thus  opposed  to  the  importation  of  foreign 
systems  and  foreign  manufactures,  and  held  the  idea  that 
God  had  given  to  each  country  either  abundance  or  lack  of 
certain  things  "so  that  by  the  commerce  and  traffic  in  these 
things  intercourse  and  copartnership  should  be  maintained 
between  the  nations."  Henry  IV.  thought  otherwise;  he 
endeavored  to  propagate  in  France  the  culture  of  the  mul- 
berry tree  and  the  raising  of  silkworms.  The  Tuileries 
and  the  site  of  the  Tournelles,  Place  Royale,  were  planted 
with  mulberry  trees;  he  wished  to  have  a  nursery  in  every 
electoral  seat,  and  he  began  by  the  communities  of  Paris, 
Orleans,  and  Tours,  where  numerous  silkworm  nurseries  rose 
to  liberate  France  from  the  tribute  which  for  years  she  paid 
Italy  in  the  purchase  of  her  silk.  A  like  intention  is  revealed 
in  his  foundation  of  manufactories  of  fine  crape  of  Bologna, 
of  gold  thread  like  that  of  Milan,  of  which  there  was 
annually  imported  into  France  1,200,000  crowns'  worth,  of 
carpets  of  thick  warp,  gilded  leather,  glass  wares,  crystal 
glasses,  mirrors,  Dutch  cloths,  and  the  like.  This  was  a 
better  way  to  keep  the  gold  in  the  kingdom  than  the  prohibi- 
tions by  which  Sully  sought  to  arrest  its  export.  In  1604 
the  king  convoked  an  "Assembly  of  Commerce."  Among 


CHAP.  XVI.]      CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE   WARS.  249 

other  things  a  general  reformation  of  the  guilds  was  pro- 
posed and  the  foundation  of  studs,  that  France  should  no 
longer  be  under  the  necessity  of  buying  war  horses  in 
Germany,  Spain,  Turkey,  and  England. 

The  war  marine  developed  by  Francis  I.  had  fallen  so 
low  that  Cardinal  d'Ossat  wrote  in  1596  to  Villeroy,  "The 
pettiest  princes  of  Italy,  notwithstanding  that  the  most  of 
them  have  each  only  an  inch  of  sea,  nevertheless  have 
galleys  in  their  naval  arsenal,  while  a  great  kingdom,  flanked 
its  whole  length  by  two  seas,  has  no  means  of  defending 
itself  on  the  water  against  pirates  and  corsairs,  and  even 
less  against  princes."  D'Ossat  disclosed  at  the  same  time 
the  importance  of  the  port  of  Toulon.  Sully  had  no  aver- 
sion to  the  navy,  but  distant  colonies  frightened  him.  The 
views  of  Henry  IV.  went  farther  than  those  of  his  min- 
isters ;  to  encourage  commerce  with  North  America,  which 
increased  to  such  a  degree  that  in  1578  there  came  to  New- 
foundland alone  150  French  ships,  he  sent  Champlain, 
a  gentleman  of  Saintonge,  to  found  in  Canada  in  1604 
Port  Royal  (to-day  Annapolis),  and  later  (1608)  Quebec  on 
the  St.  Lawrence.  The  name  of  this  mariner  remains 
attached  to  one  of  the  great  lakes  of  the  country,  but  the 
country  itself  is  no  longer  French,  though  it  has  preserved 
the  language  and  cherishes  sweet  souvenirs  of  the  mother 
country.  Henry  thought  even  of  creating  a  company  of 
the  Indies  capable  of  rivaling  those  which  were  formed  in 
England  and  Holland;  he  had  not  the  time  to  realize  this 
project;  but  he  signed  a  treaty  with  Turkey  in  which  it  was 
stipulated  that  all  Christian  nations  could  carry  on  com- 
merce freely  in  the  Levant  under  the  banner  and  protection 
of  France  and  under  the  orders  of  the  foreign  consuls. 
That  flag  was  the  only  one  respected  on  the  Barbary  coasts. 

One  still  sees  here  and  there  on  the  French  hills  a  few  aged 
elms  which  the  peasants  call  Rosnis.*  They  are  vestiges  of 
highways  traced  by  Sully,  who  well  knew  that  the  most 
fertile  country  remains  poor  if  the  communications  are 
bad.  The  plans  of  all  the  great  canals  by  which  France  was 
afterward  furrowed  were  then  conceived.  One  only  could 
then  be  executed,  that  of  Briare,  which  leaves  the  Loire  and 
joins  the  Seine  at  Moret,  9  kilometers  from  Fontaine- 

*  Sully  was  born  at  Rosny,  and  was  often  called  Rosny  or  Rosni  him- 
self, a  name  commonly  applied  by  the  peasants  to  anything  connected 
with  him — Eu. 


250  THE   CA  THOLIC  RESTORA  TION.         [BOOK  IV. 

bleau.  This  is  the  oldest  example  of  a  canal  with  locks 
uniting  two  different  slopes.  Its  length  is  55  kilometers, 
its  inclination  is  117  meters,  served  by  40  locks. 

The  provincial  legions  of  Francis  I.  and  Henry  II.  had 
not  been  entirely  destroyed;  some  of  their  companies 
remained,  from  which  regiments  were  formed.  There  were 
only  four  of  these  regiments  in  1595,  commanded  by  camp 
masters.  Henry  raised  them  to  eleven,  Louis  XIII.  to 
thirty.  But  the  habit  of  hiring  foreign  troops  continued. 
The  cavalry  still  formed  an  undue  proportion  of  the  army, 
the  nobility  wishing  to  serve  only  there.  The  military  house 
of  the  king  constituted  a  select  corps.  The  artillery  in  the 
hands  of  Sully  assumed  such  importance  that  its  grand 
master  was  included  among  the  great  officers  of  the  crown. 
After  1572  no  lord  was  permitted  to  keep  cannon  in  his 
castle  without  express  permission  from  the  king.  Sully 
introduced  the  system  of  monthly  payments,  the  soldiers 
being  formerly  paid  only  two  or  four  times  a  year.  The 
superintendent  of  fortifications  was  first  appointed  in  1598, 
that  of  the  commissariat  in  1597.  These  two  great  depart- 
ments, now  regulated,  had  formerly  depended  upon  luck. 
Sully  carefully  watched  over  them;  he  had  a  number  of  for- 
tresses repaired,  and  those  arsenals  restocked  which  the  civil 
war  had  emptied.  Finally,  Henry  IV.  entertained  the  idea 
which  Louis  XIV.  realized  so  magnificently  of  assuring  an 
asylum  to  veteran  soldiers,  but  his  hospital  of  charity  in  the 
Rue  de  Lourcine  did  not  survive  him. 

The  solicitude  of  Henry  IV.  for  the  prosperity  of  France 
acquired  him  a  legitimate  popularity.  His  weaknesses  were 
forgotten;  men  saw  only  the  king  who  promised  an  asylum 
to  the  invalided  soldier,  and  to  the  peasant  a  chicken  in  the 
kettle  every  Sunday.  But  if  the  people  blessed  him  it  was 
otherwise  with  certain  parties  and  certain  men  whom  his 
glorious  policy  wounded  profoundly.  The  favor  shown 
Gabrielle  d'Estrees,  whom  he  made  Duchess  of  Beaufort, 
that  shown  Henriette  d'Entraigues,  whom  he  created  March- 
ioness de  Verneuil,  promises  forgotten,  services  rendered 
to  the  King  of  Navarre  and  which  the  King  of  France  could 
not  pay,  made  some  murmur  and  excited  others  to  plots. 

The  most  celebrated  of  these  conspiracies  was  that  of 
Marshal  de  Biron.  The  foreigner  had  his  share  in  it.  The 
Duke  of  Savoy  could  not  console  himself  for  the  loss  of  La 
Bresse,  nor  Spain  for  having  endured  so  many  humiliations. 


CHAP.  XVI.]      CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE   WARS.  251 

They  endeavored  to  take  revenge  by  urging  the  French 
lords  to  revolt,  who  having  seen  the  king  so  impoverished 
a  gentleman,  obeyed  him  only  regretfully.  The  able  but 
haughty  Biron  was  in  the  front  rank  of  those  who  found  the 
yoke  of  the  king  and  of  the  law  too  heavy.  The  first  time, 
in  1600,  Henry  pardoned  him,  and  he  would  have  pardoned 
him  a  second  time  if  Biron  had  consented  to  make  the 
avowals  which  Henry  asked  him.  Irritated  by  his  obstinacy 
and  willing  to  give  the  nobility  one  of  those  examples  which 
Richelieu  was  to  multiply,  he  allowed  the  sentence  to  be 
executed.  Biron  was  beheaded  (1602).  Another  old 
friend  of  the  king,  the  Duke  de  Bouillon,  was  implicated  in 
this  conspiracy,  but  he  fled  in  season.  The  father  and 
brother  of  the  Marchioness  de  Verneuil  intrigued  once 
more  with  Spain  in  1604  and  were  condemned  to  death. 
The  marchioness  obtained  commutation  of  the  penalty. 

Thus  Spain,  no  longer  able  to  make  war,  wove  plots. 
She  had  cause  for  fear,  inasmuch  as  the  power  of  the  house 
of  Austria,  master  of  so  many  countries  and  so  firmly  lean- 
ing on  Catholic  Europe,  was  the  constant  preoccupation  of 
Henry  IV.  Its  destruction  was  his  dream,  but  this  dream 
was  ennobled  by  its  end — the  establishment  in  Europe  of  a 
political  system  which  should  place  under  the  guarantee  of 
all  the  powers  the  independence  of  religions  and  of  nation- 
alities. He  wished  to  drive  out  the  house  of  Austria  from 
the  Netherlands,  Italy,  and  Germany;  to  make  of  Hungary, 
increased  by  the  Austrian  provinces,  a  powerful  kingdom 
capable  of  holding  its  own  against  the  Ottomans  even  if  it  did 
not  succeed  in  relegating  them  to  Asia;  to  give  Lombardy 
to  the  Duke  of  Savoy,  Sicily  to  Venice;  of  the  peninsular 
portion  of  Italy  to  constitute  a  single  state  with  the  Pope  as 
head;  of  Genoa  and  Florence  with  the  neighboring  petty 
lordships  to  form  a  republic  and  another  in  the  Netherlands; 
to  extend  the  Swiss  Confederation  to  the  Tyrol,  and  to  leave 
Germany  an  elective  empire.  Europe,  then,  with  its  six 
hereditary  kingdoms,  France,  Spain,  England,  Sweden, 
Denmark,  and  Lombardy;  with  its  five  elective  states, 
Poland,  Hungary,  Bohemia,  the  empire,  and  the  papacy; 
with  its  four  republics,  Venice,  Genoa  and  Florence,  Swit- 
zerland, and  the  Netherlands,  would  have  itself  composed 
a  great  republic,  having  a  supreme  council  of  deputies  from 
all  the  states,  which  would  have  been  charged  with  pre- 
venting injustice  and  war.  The  reign  of  right  would  have 


252  THE  CATHOLIC  RESTORATION.  [BOOK  IV. 

replaced  that  of  force.  This  project  was  the  application  of 
a  great  principle,  respect  of  nationalities;  in  proof  of  the  dis- 
interestedness of  his  views  Henry  in  this  sublime  readjustment 
of  Europe  asked  nothing  for  France,  nothing  at  least  which 
it  did  not  appear  legitimate  to  accord.  "I  desire,"  said  he, 
"that  the  Spanish  language  belong  to  the  Spaniard,  the 
German  to  the  German,  but  all  that  is  French  ought  to  be 
mine."  And  he  had  cast  his  eyes  upon  Savoy,  which  its 
duke  would  quit  when  taking  Lombardy,  upon  Lorraine, 
whose  heiress  he  wished  to  betroth  to  the  dauphin,  upon 
Belgium  and  Franche-Comte,  which  had  no  reason  for 
belonging  to  Spain. 

Without  doubt  he  did  not  hope  to  accomplish  all  these 
things;  but  to  execute  a  part  of  them  he  counted  upon  the 
alliance  with  England,  whose  queen,  Elizabeth,  till  her  death 
(1603)  lived  in  the  best  relations  with  France;  upon  the 
Duke  of  Savoy,  to  whom  he  offered  15,000  men  under  the 
Constable  Lesdiguieres,  already  encamped  in  Dauphine, 
asking  him  in  return  nothing  more  than  to  carve  out  for 
himself  a  kingdom  in  Spanish  Lombardy;  upon  the  Protes- 
tants of  the  Netherlands,  whom  he  supported  against  the 
Spaniards;  upon  those  of  Germany,  who  were  then  forming 
the  Evangelical  Union,  and  of  which  one  of  the  principal 
chiefs,  Maurice,  Landgrave  of  Hesse, came  to  confer  with  him. 
He  had  understandings  even  among  the  Moorish  popula- 
tions of  Spain,  then  under  the  terror  of  the  Inquisition. 
The  Duke  of  Cleves  and  Juliers  had  just  died,  "leaving 
everybody  his  heir."  Protestants  and  Catholics  already 
disputed  the  rich  succession;  it  was  a  pretext  to  interfere 
and  begin  the  war  which  the  increasing  hate  of  the  t\vo 
religious  parties  in  the  empire  rendered  inevitable.  The 
most  formidable  preparations  were  made.  Forty  thousand 
men  with  a  powerful  artillery  were  advancing  toward  the 
frontiers  of  Champagne  when  the  hero  whom  all  were  await- 
ing was  assassinated  (May  14,  1610)  by  the  fanatic  Ravaillac. 

Without  loving  the  arts  like  Francis  I.,  Henry  II.,  and 
Charles  IX.,  Henry  IV.  comprehended  how  much  splendor 
they  cast  upon  a  reign.  He  added  two  pavilions  to  the 
Tuileries,  and  wished  to  prolong  the  grand  gallery  of  the 
Louvre  as  far  as  the  latter  chateau,  thus  passing  across  the 
ramparts  of  the  city  so  as  not  to  find  himself  on  some  day 
of  riot  shut  up  in  his  palace  as  Henry  III.  had  almost  been. 
He  had  not  the  time  to  finish  that  magnificent  undertak- 


CHAP.  XVI.]      CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE   WARS.  253 

ing.  His  architect,*  Androuet  Ducerceau,  was  for  once  suffi- 
ciently well  inspired  to  follow  the  original  plans.  He  also 
terminated  the  Pont  Neuf,  commenced  under  Henry  III., 
and  the  facade  of  the  city  hall  (Hotel  de  Ville),  whose 
foundations  had  been  laid  under  Francis  I.  In  1604  was 
laid  the  first  stone  of  the  Place  Royale,  where  appears  the 
intermixture  of  brick,  stone,  and  slate,  restored  style  of  the 
old  Italian  architecture.  Already  the  heavy  and  low  arcade 
replaced  the  square  doors  with  rounded  angles  of  the  castles 
of  the  Renaissance;  the  stone  cross  deserted  the  double 
casements,  which  opened  empty  and  wide,  cold  in  aspect, 
with  their  great  glass  windows.  In  the  arts  the  Renaissance 
was  already  in  decline ;  but  a  new  era  was  about  to  com- 
mence in  letters.  Montaigne  died  three  years  after  the 
accession  of  Henry  IV.,  and  Malherbe,  the  "pensioner  of 
the  king,"  was  creating  the  style  and  the  poetic  language 
which  Corneille,  Racine,  and  Boileau  were  to  employ. 


BOOK   V. 

THE     ASCENDENCY     OF    FRANCE    UNDER 
LOUIS  XIII.  AND  LOUIS  XIV.  (1610-1715). 


CHAPTER   XVII. 

LOUIS     XIII.    AND    RICHELIEU  — INTERNAL    PACIFICA- 
TION (1610-43). 


The  Minority  of  Louis  XIII.  and  the  Regency  of  Marie  de  Medici  (1610- 
17). — Richelieu  Humbles  the  Protestants  and  the  High  Nobility 
(1624-42). 


WHILE  the  royal  power  in  England  was  receiving  heavy 
blows,  in  France  it  was  maintaining  its  supremacy,  and 
The  minority  thanks  to  the  genius  of  Richelieu  (1624-42) 
of  Louis  XIIL,  was  becoming  wholly  absolute.  But  the  min- 
of  Mar!fende  istry  of  the  cardinal  had  been  preceded  by 
Medici  (1610-17).  fourteen  years  of  troubles  and  civil  wars 
which  almost  endangered  the  work  of  Henry  IV.  His  son 
and  successor,  Louis  XIIL,  was  only  nine  years  of  age.  It 
was  necessary  to  make  provision  for  the  government  during 
the  minority  of  this  child.  According  to  precedents  the 
regency  belonged  to  the  mother  of  the  king:  Blanche  of 
Castile  had  ruled  during  the  minority  of  Louis  IX. ;  Catherine 
de  Medici  during  that  of  Charles  IX.  Marie  de  Medici, 
who  had  always  remained  without  influence  and  almost  a 
foreigner,  thought  it  necessary  to  give  some  sort  of  legal  sanc- 
tion to  her  authority.  She  addressed  herself  to  the  parlia- 
ment of  Paris.  The  king  had  died  May  14;  on  the  follow- 
ing day  Parliament  in  consequence  of  the  threatening 
summons  of  the  Duke  of  Epernon  conferred  the  regency 
upon  Marie  de  Medici  (1610).  Faint-hearted  and  narrow- 
minded,  the  widow  of  Henry  IV.  was  wholly  incompetent 


255 


256  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

to  continue  the  work  which  that  great  king  had  undertaken; 
abroad,  after  a  short  period  of  hesitation  which  gained 
the  Protestants  in  Germany  the  aid  of  a  French  army  to 
take  Juliers,  she  abandoned  all  the  projects  of  her  husband; 
at  home  she  sent  the  upright  Sully  back  to  his  own  estates, 
and  bestowed  all  her  favor  upon  Concini,  a  Florentine 
adventurer,  who  became  Marquis  of  Ancre,  and  afterward 
Marshal  of  France.  In  a  few  years  he  amassed  a  fortune 
of  8,000,000  francs. 

By  his  energy,  and  especially  by  his  skill,  Henry  IV.  had 
reduced  the  nobles  to  obedience.  He  held  himself  above 
the  factions  in  order  to  dominate  them.  After  his  death 
they  reappeared,  each  with  its  interests  and  passions.  The 
Protestants  were  displeased  on  account  of  Sully's  disgrace; 
but,  while  taking  at  Saumur  measures  for  defense,  they 
said:  "We  have  all  the  liberty  of  conscience  we  can 
desire,  and  we  are  not  willing  to  abandon  our  wives  and 
homes  at  the  instigation  of  a  few  factionists."  For  the 
moment,  therefore,  they  allowed  the  leaders  of  the  aristoc- 
racy— Conde,  the  two  Vendomes,  Longueville,  Mayenne, 
and  the  intriguing  Duke  of  Bouillon — to  take  up  arms  against 
the  court,  and  to  publish  manifestoes  in  which  they  de- 
manded the  alleviation  of  the  sufferings  of  the  people.  This 
movement,  aimless  and  groundless,  had  no  other  cause  than 
the  weakness  of  the  government.  Concini  served  as  a  pre- 
text. He  was  accepted  by  the  nobles  from  the  time  that  he 
paid  for  their  adhesion.  By  the  treaty  of  St.  Menehould 
he  gave  money  and  honors  to  all.  The  Prince  of  Conde  re- 
ceived 450,000  francs  in  cash;  the  Duke  of  Mayenne  300,000 
francs  toward  his  marriage;  M.  de  Longueville  a  pension  of 
100,000  francs.  The  savings  which  Henry  IV.  had  left  in 
the  vaults  of  the  Bastille  were  encroached  upon.  From 
3,000,000  francs,  the  total  amount  of  pensions  rose  to 
6,000,000  francs.  But  the  court  that  year  (1614)  did  not 
pay  the  stockholders  of  the  townhall. 

To  color  their  rebellion  and  to  disguise  their  cupidity 
the  nobles  had  demanded  the  convocation  of  the  States 
General.  The  assembly  convened  five  months  after  the 
peace  of  St.  Menehould  (May  27,  1614).  The  third  estate 
was  remarkable  for  its  comprehension  of  the  needs  of  the 
country  and  found  in  Robert  Miron  an  eloquent  inter- 
preter. Uniting  patriotism  to  common  sense  and  love  of 
order,  the  third  estate  desired  that  the  inviolability  of  the 


CHAP.  XVII.J       LOUIS  XIII.  AND  RICHELIEU.  257 

royal  person  and  the  independence  of  the  crown  relative  to 
the  Holy  See  should  be  declared;  it  demanded  at  the  same 
time  publicity  in  financial  matters,  the  abolition  of  the  pen- 
sions which  the  treasury  was  paying  to  the  other  two  orders, 
a  more  just  distribution  of  public  taxes  among  the  people, 
the  extension  of  the  villain  tax  to  the  privileged  orders,  the 
equality  of  all  before  the  law,  liberty  of  commerce  and  in- 
dustry, and  the  periodic  convocation  of  the  States  General. 
The  first  proposition  was  rejected  as  rash;  the  second  "be- 
cause the  finances  are  the  nerves  of  the  state,  and  because 
the  nerves  are  concealed  under  the  skin;"  the  others  as  so 
many  attacks  upon  the  nobility  and  the  clergy.  In  vain 
Robert  Miron  brought  before  the  king  the  picture  of  the 
public  misery  and  the  means  of  remedy.  "If  your  Majesty 
does  not  provide,"  he  said,  "it  is  to  be  feared  lest  despair 
reveal  to  the  people  that  the  soldier  is  nothing  but  a  peasant 
in  arms,  and  lest,  when  the  vine  dresser  shall  have  taken  up 
the  arquebuse,  he  become  the  hammer  instead  of  the  anvil." 
But  the  nobility  displayed  the  most  haughty  disposition; 
heated  and  deplorable  altercations  took  place  between  the 
orders.  The  court  took  advantage  of  these  rivalries  to  con- 
cede nothing,  and  after  having  wearied  the  deputies  by 
intentional  delays,  put  forward  the  pretext  that  the  council 
chamber  was  needed  to  give  a  ballet,  and  the  assembly  room 
was  closed  (March  24,  1615).  The  deputies,  however,  had 
the  instinct  rather  than  the  consciousness  of  their  role.  No 
protest  was  brought  forward.  This  was  the  last  convoca- 
tion of  the  States  General  before  that  of  1789. 

The  Prince  of  Conde  had  found  his  first  revolt  too  prof- 
itable not  to  attempt  a  second  (1616).  By  the  treaty  of  Lou- 
dun  he  succeeded  in  obtaining  for  himself  1,500,000  francs, 
for  his  friends  proportional  sums.  All  the  court  thronged 
around  him;  for  an  instant  he  seemed  the  real  king  of 
France.  Concini  was  driven  to  extremities;  but,  following 
the  advice  given  him  some  time  before  by  Richelieu,  then 
Bishop  of  Lufon  and  chaplain  of  the  queen,  he  finally  had 
the  courage  to  order  the  committal  of  the  prince  to  the 
Bastille.  This  measure  provoked  a  revolt  on  the  part  of  the 
nobles:  against  them  he  opposed  three  armies;  but  the  king 
took  sides  with  the  malcontents,  and  conspired  with  his  own 
favorite,  Albert  de  Luynes,  against  the  favorite  of  his 
mother. 

This  newcomer,  already  thirty-eight  years  old,  was  the 


258  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

son  of  an  officer  of  fortune;  by  his  skill  in  snaring  shrikes 
he  had  won  the  good  graces  of  the  prince,  who  made  him 
his  confidant;  de  Luynes  represented  to  the  king  that  he 
was  old  enough  to  reign,  and  that  it  was  disgraceful  for  him 
at  the  age  of  fifteen  to  allow  himself  to  be  guided  as  a 
child.  Louis  summoned  Vitry,  the  captain  of  the  guards, 
and  ordered  him  to  arrest  the  Marshal  of  Ancre,  charg- 
ing him  to  kill  the  marshal  if  he  made  any  opposition. 
Vitry  hastened  to  obey,  and  as  Concini  was  drawing  his 
sword  to  surrender  it  he  stretched  him  dead  with  his 
pistol.  The  body  of  the  unfortunate  served  the  infuri- 
ated populace  as  a  plaything.  His  wife,  Leonora  Galigai, 
was  accused  of  sorcery.  She  was  asked  by  what  witch- 
craft she  had  obtained  such  power  over  the  queen 
mother.  "By  the  ascendency,"  she  replied,  "that  a 
superior  mind  has  over  a  weak  person!"  She  was  none  the 
less  sentenced  to  death  at  the  stake  (1617). 

Louis  XIII.  thought  he  had  escaped  from  guardianship; 
but  de  Luynes  replaced  Concini.  Marie  de  Medici  with  the 
assistance  of  the  lords,  against  whom  she  had  but  just  now 
been  contending,  tried  to  overthrow  him,  and  after  a  short 
war  found  herself  fortunate  in  obtaining  the  government  of 
Angers  (1619).  A  second  attempt,  made  the  following 
year,  succeeded  no  better.  However,  Richelieu,  her  chief 
chaplain,  obtained  the  confirmation  of  the  preceding  treaty 
(1620). 

The  Protestants  had  taken  no  part  in  any  of  these  in- 
trigues, thanks  to  the  patriotic  counsels  of  Duplessis  Mornay 
and  to  the  prudence  of  Sully.  But  by  the  side  of  these 
illustrious  leaders  there  arose  the  rival  influence  of  a  young 
man  as  brave  as  he  was  eloquent  and  energetic,  the  Duke 
of  Rohan.  The  re-establishment  of  the  Catholic  religion 
at  Beam,  and  more  especially  the  injunction  laid  upon  the 
Reformed  Bearnese  to  surrender  the  ecclesiastical  property 
which  they  had  seized,  excited  the  indignation  of  the 
Huguenot  party.  The  opinion  of  Sully  and  Mornay  was 
disregarded  and  in  the  assembly  of  La  Rochelle  a  general 
uprising  in  arms  was  declared.  The  Protestants  dreamed 
of  founding  in  the  marshes  of  the  Aunis  a  French  Hol- 
land, of  which  La  Rochelle  should  be  the  Amsterdam. 
Their  806  churches  formed  16  provinces.  Upon  the  re- 
fusal of  the  Duke  of  Bouillon,  Rohan  obtained  the  supreme 
command. 


CHAP.  XVII.]      LOUIS  XIII.  AND  RICHELIEU.  259 

De  Luynes,  who  had  been  appointed  constable,  laid  siege 
to  Montauban;  but  he  failed  in  this  attempt,  and  was 
carried  off  by  a  malignant  fever  (1621).  The  following 
year  the  king  succeeded  in  driving  out  Soubise  from  the 
island  of  Re  and  in  capturing  St.  Foi.  The  Protestants 
sued  for  peace.  The  treaty  of  Montpellier,  comfirmative  of 
the  edict  of  Nantes,  granted  them  La  Rochelle  and  Mon- 
tauban as  cities  of  safety,  but  forbade  their  holding  any 
political  assembly  without  the  consent  of  the  king  (1622). 

Marie  de  Medici  had  regained  her  former  influence;  she 

had  admitted  to  the  ministry  her  habitual  counselor,  the 

Richelieu          Bishop  of  Lucon,  for  whom  she  had  obtained 

humbles    the      m    1622  a  cardinal's  hat.       As   soon  as   he 

Protestants  and  ,  ,  ..     ,  ..  ,        ..     ,  . 

the  high  nobii-  appeared  at  the  council  he  eclipsed  all  his 
ity (1624-42.).  colleagues.  His  will  no  more  recognized 
obstacles  than  did  his  mind  limits.  Eager  for  power,  but 
in  order  to  accomplish  grand  things,  he  immediately  ob- 
tained an  extraordinary  influence  ever  the  king.  Louis 
XIII.  possessed  enough  intelligence  to  conceive  the  most 
lofty  policy,  enough  virtue  to  love  the  good,  but  too  much 
indolence  to  carry  it  into  execution.  He  left  Richelieu  to 
his  own  devices,  and  with  the  exception  of  a  few  moments 
of  weakness  supported  him  for  eighteen  years  against  the 
hatred  of  the  courtiers. 

Richelieu's  plan  was  extensive  but  simple:  at  home  to 
humble  the  high  nobility  and  to  impose  upon  all  the  law  of 
the  king;  to  reduce  the  Protestants  to  such  a  condition  that 
they  would  form  only  a  dissenting  religious  community; 
abroad  to  overthrow  the  preponderance  of  the  house  of 
Austria.  This  was  the  triple  policy  which  he  pursued  dur- 
ing his  glorious  ministry. 

At  first  Richelieu  advanced  too  far.  He  wished  to  carry 
out  all  his  schemes  at  once.  He  attacked  the  Spaniards  and 
the  Protestants.  Valtellina  is  a  little  valley  which  estab- 
lished communication  between  the  Milanais,  a  possession  of 
the  Spanish  branch,  and  the  Tyrol,  the  property  of  the  Ger- 
man branch  of  the  house  of  Austria.  The  inhabitants,  sub- 
jects of  the  Protestant  republic  of  the  Grisons,  were  of  the 
Catholic  faith.  They  had  revolted  at  the  instigation  of  the 
court  of  Madrid,  which  had  caused  several  forts  to  be  built 
within  their  boundaries  for  the  professed  purpose  of  protect- 
ing them  against  the  heretics.  The  Grisons  protested,  and 
the  Pope  was  chosen  mediator.  He  hesitated  a  long  time,  and 


260  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

was  on  the  point  of  deciding  in  favor  of  the  Spaniards  when 
Richelieu  entered  upon  office.  He  wrote  immediately  to  the 
French  ambassador  at  Rome:  "The  king  has  changed  his 
ministry,  and  the  ministry  its  maxim;  an  army  will  be  sent 
into  Valtellina,  which  will  render  the  Pope  less  undecided 
and  the  Spaniards  more  tractable."  In  fact  the  Marquis 
of  Cceuvres  arrived  with  8000  men  and  restored  Valtellina 
to  the  Orisons  (1624). 

At  the  same  time  Richelieu,  supposing  that  he  had 
deprived  the  Protestants  of  the  support  of  England  by  the 
marriage  of  Henrietta  of  France  to  Charles  I.,  directed  a 
vigorous  attack  against  them ;  the  fleet  of  La  Rochelle  was 
destroyed.  But  the  cardinal  was  arrested  in  the  midst  of 
his  success  by  a  plot  which  aimed  at  nothing  less  than  the 
assassination  of  the  prime  minister,  perhaps  even  at  the 
deposition  of  the  king.  Influenced  by  some  courtiers, 
Gaston,  the  heir  presumptive  to  the  crown,  refused  to 
marry  Mile,  de  Montpensier:  the  enemies  of  Richelieu 
would  have  preferred  that  the  prince  should  establish  for 
himself  a  powerful  alliance  outside  of  France.  The  im- 
prisonment of  the  Marshal  of  Ornano  made  no  more 
impression  upon  the  court  than  did  the  admonitions  of  the 
cardinal.  Richelieu,  therefore,  granted  peace  to  the 
Huguenots  and  signed  with  Spain  the  treaty  of  Mon£on 
(1626),  for  the  purpose  of  leaving  no  means  of  support  for 
the  intriguers;  then  caused  the  arrest  of  Chalais.  A  com- 
mission condemned  him  and  he  was  beheaded  (1626).  This 
was  giving  a  terrible  lesson  to  the  nobles.  They  received 
a  second;  two  noblemen  of  the  highest  rank,  Bouteville- 
Montmorency  and  the  Marquis  of  Beuvron,  were  sent  to  the 
scaffold  for  violating  the  edict  against  duels.  "It  is 
unjust,"  Richelieu  remarked  to  the  king,  "to  desire  to  set 
an  example  by  the  punishment  of  men  of  mean  rank,  who 
are  trees  casting  no  shadow  at  all;  even  as  it  is  very  neces- 
sary to  treat  well  the  nobles  who  act  well,  it  is  they  also 
who  must  he  held  under  discipline."  But  if  the  cardinal 
was  right  in  punishing  the  guilty,  still  it  is  a  source  of 
regret  that  sometimes,  like  Louis  XL,  he  gave  to  justice  the 
appearance  of  vengeance,  and  made  the  scaffold  an  instru- 
ment of  government  (1627). 

By  these  measures  Richelieu  had  regained  his  freedom 
of  action,  and  he  made  use  of  it  to  prepare  a  decisive  attack 
against  the  Reformers.  He  reorganized  the  army,  the  navy, 


CHAP.  XVII.]      LOUIS  XIII.  AND  RICHELIEU.  261 

and  the  finances;  he  abolished  the  office  of  constable  after 
the  death  of  Lesdiguieres,  bought  for  1,000,000  francs  that 
of  high  admiral  from  Montmorency,  and  by  an  assembly  of 
notables  caused  vigorous  measures  to  be  taken  against  the 
farmers  of  the  revenue  who  had  not  rendered  their  accounts 
for  five  years.  At  the  same  time  he  made  an  alliance  with 
the  Dutch,  who  lent  him  some  vessels  against  Genoa;  these 
he  employed  in  attacking  La  Rochelle. 

Charles  I.  could  not  allow  that  town  to  fall  without  mak- 
ing some  effort  in  its  behalf.  He  sent  his  favorite,  Bucking- 
ham, with  a  fleet.  The  English  landed  on  the  island  of  Re; 
but  they  were  repulsed  by  Toiras  and  Schomberg.  The 
royal  army  invested  La  Rochelle  by  land.  To  isolate  the 
city  from  the  sea  and  to  prevent  the  approach  of  English 
aid  Richelieu  caused  an  immense  embankment  to  be  con- 
structed and  lined  it  with  cannon.  By  his  vigilance  and 
firmness  he  rendered  futile  the  ill  will  of  the  generals  and 
of  the  nobles.  "We  shall  be  insane  enough,"  exclaimed 
Bassompierre,  "to  take  La  Rochelle." 

The  defense  was  heroic;  but  the  English  fleet,  which 
appeared  twice  before  the  embankment,  either  did  not  dare 
or  was  not  strong  enough  to  break  through.  La  Rochelle 
capitulated  (1628).  Of  30,000  inhabitants  there  remained 
5000. 

The  Duke  of  Rohan,  who  was  making  a  feeble  struggle  in 
Languedoc  against  forces  far  superior  to  his  own,  was 
obliged  to  disband  his  army.  The  peace  of  Alais,  or  the 
edict  of  grace,  allowed  the  Protestants  the  civil  securities 
and  the  religious  freedom  which  the  edict  of  Nantes  had 
given  them ;  but  their  fortified  places  were  dismantled. 
They  ceased  to  form  a  state  in  the  state  (1629). 

The  political  unity  of  France  was  re-established  and  all 
trace  of  the  religious  wars  effaced.  The  enemies  of  Riche- 
lieu were  only  all  the  more  bent  upon  destroying  him. 
Marie  de  Medici  was  astonished  to  find  in  her  former  chap- 
lain a  grave  statesman,  and  not  a  servile  tool.  She  was  on 
the  point  of  extorting  from  the  sick  king  an  order  of  exile. 
The  cardinal  was  about  to  depart  when  La  Valette  and  St. 
Simon,  the  father  of  the  celebrated  writer,  showed  him  that 
as  yet  all  was  not  lost.  He  had  an  interview  with  the  king: 
a  few  hours  of  conversation  sufficed  to  reinstate  him  with 
all  his  former  influence.  Marie  de  Medici,  who  was  already 
receiving  the  compliments  of  the  court,  was  undeceived  by 


262  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

the  desertion  of  those  around  her.  This  was  called  "the 
day  of  the  dupes"  (1630).  It  caused  victims  also;  the  two 
Marillacs,  the  one  Keeper  of  the  Seals,  the  other  Marshal  of 
France,  were  impeached  by  the  queen  mother.  The  latter, 
accused  of  bribery,  was  tried  by  a  criminal  commission,  in 
the  palace  even  of  Richelieu  at  Ruel,  condemned,  and 
executed.  His  brother  died  in  a  fortress.  As  for  Marie  de 
Medici,  the  castle  of  Compiegne  was  chosen  for  her  im- 
prisonment; she  escaped  six  months  afterward  and  retired 
to  Brussels  (1631). 

Gaston  had  left  the  court,  had  found  refuge  in  the  castle 
of  the  Duke  of  Lorraine,  and  had  married  the  sister  of  that 
foreign  prince.  Forced  to  flee  for  shelter  to  Belgium,  he 
succeeded  in  gaining  over  the  Duke  of  Montmorency, 
Governor  of  Languedoc,  and  mustered  a  few  thousand 
adventurers.  But  he  found  no  assistance  in  his  march. 
The  towns  closed  their  gates  against  him.  He  rejoined 
Montmorency,  however,  at  Languedoc,  and  found  himself 
then  at  the  head  of  a  small  army.  When  the  royal  troops 
appeared  Montmorency  attacked  with  fury,  and  was  cap- 
tured in  spite  of  a  brave  resistance.  Gaston  made  no 
attempt  to  rescue  him.  The  last  scion  of  the  elder  branch 
of  the  house  of  Montmorency,  contemporaneous  with  the 
first  Capetians,  died  upon  the  scaffold  (1632).  The  Duke 
of  Lorraine  paid  the  expenses  of  the  war.  Louis  XIII. 
occupied  his  duchy  with  troops  (1633),  and  it  remained 
in  the  hands  of  France  until  the  close  of  the  century. 

This  execution  inspired  fear  among  the  nobles,  but  did 
not  prevent  new  conspiracies.  In  spite  of  his  cowardice 
Gaston  still  found  accomplices;  but  his  favorite,  Puy- 
laurens,  was  cast  into  the  Bastille  and  there  died  (1635). 
Three  years  later  the  birth  of  a  dauphin,  who  became 
Louis  XIV.,  took  away  from  Gaston  the  title  and  rank  of 
heir  to  the  throne  (1638).  The  humiliation  inflicted  upon 
the  Duke  of  Epernon,  the  proudest  of  the  great  lords,  and 
the  condemnation  to  death  of  the  Duke  of  Valetta  for  a 
military  blunder,  made  it  clear  to  all  that  a  new  era  had 
come,  that  of  military  obedience.  However,  the  Count  of 
Soissons,  of  the  house  of  Conde,  still  endeavored  to  over- 
throw the  dreaded  cardinal;  victor  at  Marf6e,  he  was  slain 
in  the  battle  (1641). 

Richelieu  had  to  struggle  till  the  end  of  his  life.  The 
young  Cinq-Mars,  for  whom  he  had  obtained  an  office  near 


CHAP.  XVII.]       LOUIS  XIII.  AND  RICHELIEU.  263 

the  person  of  the  king,  formed  a  plot  for  his  ruin.  Louis 
XIII.  himself  joined  the  conspiracy.  But  Cinq-Mars 
destroyed  himself  by  signing  a  treaty  of  alliance  with  Count 
Olivarez,  the  real  ruler  of  Spain.  This  intrigue  ended  as 
all  the  others,  in  punishments;  Cinq-Mars  was  beheaded, 
also  his  friend  de  Thou  (1642),  and  the  Duke  of  Bouillon, 
his  fellow-conspirator,  was  obliged  to  surrender  to  the  king 
his  two  strongholds,  Sedan  and  Raucourt. 

As  early  as  1626  Richelieu  had  ordered  the  demolition 
of  such  feudal  fortresses  as  could  not  serve  for  frontier 
defenses.  He  had  also  abolished  the  important  military 
offices  of  constable  and  of  high  admiral,  because  they  gave 
too  much  power  to  those  who  were  invested  with  them; 
finally,  to  be  master  everywhere,  he  had  imposed  silence 
upon  Parliament  regarding  public  matters,  and  had  avoided 
convening  the  States  General. 

Thus  Richelieu  had  caused  everything  to  bend  under  his 
control !  The  people  were  plunged  from  one  danger  into 
another;  aristocratic  license  was  followed  by  royal  despo- 
tism, which,  regarding  itself  as  above  all  law,  sometimes  set 
itself  above  justice,  and  according  to  its  own  will  disposed 
of  the  fortune,  the  liberty,  and  the  life  of  the  citizens. 
Under  Richelieu  were  witnessed  not  only  arbitrary  confisca- 
tions and  imprisonments,  but  capital  punishments  pro- 
nounced by  letters  patent  addressed  to  Parliament. 

The  ministry  of  Cardinal  Richelieu  did  not  have  as  its 
sole  results  in  the  interior  of  the  kingdom  the  ruin  of  the 
Protestants  as  a  political  party  and  the  subjection  of  the 
nobles ;  important  reforms  also  were  effected  or  measures 
taken  for  their  completion. 

In  the  management  of  the  finances  he  did  not  show  the 
patient  application  of  a  wise  administrator  who  has  only  his 
budget  to  regulate.  The  needs  of  the  war  raised  the  ex- 
penses so  high  that  he  employed  to  meet  the  disbursements 
not  the  best  methods,  but  those  which  were  the  most  speedy 
and  efficacious,  such  as  the  creation  of  new  offices,  the 
increase  of  taxes  and  of  loans,  often  repeated  at  a  high 
rate  of  interest.  At  his  death  of  the  more  than  80,000,000 
francs  that  the  country  was  paying  the  treasury  was  not 
receiving  33,500,000  francs,  and  as  the  expenditure  was 
about  89,000,000  francs,  the  deficit  amounted  to  56,000,000 
francs;  three  years'  revenue  was  consumed  in  advance. 
However,  the  spirit  of  order  with  which  he  was  animated 


264  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

caused  him  to  discover  a  partial  remedy,  which  was  to  prove 
of  service  afterward  by  opening  a  way  out  of  the  chaos  in 
which  even  after  Sully  the  financial  organization  of  the  king- 
dom still  continued.  That  remedy  was  the  creation  of 
intendants  (1635).  These  new  magistrates,  men  of  obscure 
birth  whose  appointments  could  be  revoked  at  the  will  of 
the  minister,  had  at  once  authority  over  the  judiciary,  over 
the  police,  and  over  the  finances.  Docile  agents  of  the 
government,  they  were  charged  with  preventing  the  encroach- 
ment of  the  parliaments  upon  financial  administration,  and 
with  counterbalancing  the  too  great  power  of  the  governors, 
who,  being  nobles  of  the  highest  rank,  considered  them- 
selves almost  independent  in  their  own  provinces,  and 
thought  of  these  as  a  patrimony  which  should  be  handed 
down  to  their  children;  in  fact  through  the  weakness 
of  the  rulers  they  had  rendered  these  governorships  almost 
hereditary  in  their  families.  Them  Richelieu  succeeded 
in  dominating  with  the  assistance  of  the  intendants,  who 
exercised  in  the  name  of  royalty  an  active  inspection  upon 
all  parts  of  the  kingdom,  concentrated  gradually  in 
their  own  hands  all  the  civil  power  of  the  province,  and 
ended  under  Louis  XIV.  by  leaving  to  the  governor  only 
military  authority  and  representation.  This  was  a  gain  for 
the  monarchy  and  for  the  national  unity.  Since  the  crea- 
tion of  a  standing  army  under  Charles  VII.  no  measure 
had  struck  the  new  feudalism  a  heavier  blow. 

One  of  the  results  of  the  siege  of  La  Rochelle  had  been  a 
first  attempt  at  organization  of  the  French  navy.  Richelieu 
intended  that  Brest,  Havre,  and  Brouage  should  serve  as 
arsenals;  he  was  mistaken  in  the  last,  but  as  to  Brest,  he 
had  chosen  well.  Before  him  the  French  had  no  real  navy. 
Numerous  vessels  were  armed,  and  in  the  Thirty  Years' 
War  French  fleets  controlled  the  ocean  and  the  Mediter- 
ranean. 

"As  far  as  Gaul  extended,"  said  Richelieu,  "so  far  should 
France  extend."  But  the  Spaniards,  masters  of  the  Nether- 
lands, Franche-Comte,  and  Roussillon,  still  surrounded 
diminished  France  on  three  sides  and  held  Italy  through 
Naples  and  Milan.  He  commenced  with  them.  In  the 
first  days  of  his  ministry  he  had  driven  the  Spaniards  from 
Valtellina.  A  few  years  later  he  interposed  in  Italy  in 
favor  of  a  French  prince,  the  Duke  of  Nevers,  who  had 
just  inherited  the  country  around  Mantua  and  Montferrat. 


CHAP.  XVII.]      LOUIS  XIII.  AND  RICHELIEU.  265 

The  Spaniards  and  the  Duke  of  Savoy  disputed  his  claim. 
Richelieu  himself  marched  across  the  Alps  with  an  army  of 
36,000  men,  and  Louis  XIII.  forced  the  pass  of  Susa.  The 
Duke  of  Savoy  hastened  to  sign  the  treaty  of  Susa,  which 
limited  the  Spaniards  to  the  Milanais.  But  before  the  year 
had  passed  the  cardinal  was  obliged  to  again  cross  the  Alps 
with  40,000  men.  The  Imperialists,  victorious  in  Germany, 
had  made  incursions  into  the  country  of  the  Grisons,  the 
Spaniards  into  Montferrat,  and  the  Duke  of  Savoy  was 
negotiating  with  all  the  world.  Savoy  was  conquered  and 
Pignerol  taken  (March,  1629).  The  peace  of  Cheracco, 
which  Mazarin  negotiated,  re-established  the  Duke  of  Man- 
tua in  his  domains,  and  compelled  Victor  Amadeus  to  sur- 
render to  Louis  XIII.  with  Pignerol  the  free  passage  of  the 
Alps  (April,  1631). 

Thus  in  1631  Richelieu  had  separated  in  Italy  the 
dominions  of  the  two  branches  of  the  house  of  Austria,  which 
were  making  efforts  to  reunite,  and  had  opened  the  penin- 
sula to  France,  but  without  hampering  her  future  action. 
He  soon  made  a  fierce  attack  upon  these  enemies  thus  sep- 
arated. This  struggle  is  the  French  period  of  the  Thirty 
Years'  War,  narrated  farther  on.  It  began  in  1635. 
Richelieu  conducted  operations  with  such  success  that 
when  he  died  (December  i,  1642),  at  the  age  of  fifty-seven 
years,  he  left  the  kingdom  augmented  by  four  provinces — 
Lorraine,  Alsace,  Artois,  and  Rousillon,  Catalonia  and  Por- 
tugal in  revolt  against  Spain,  and  the  Swedes  and  French 
almost  at  the  gates  of  Vienna. 

He  had  therefore  fulfilled  the  promise  which  he  had 
made  to  Louis  XIII.  on  entering  upon  his  ministry;  he  had 
raised  the  name  of  the  king  to  its  proper  place  among  foreign 
nations.  "People  began  to  realize,"  says  a  contemporary 
writer, '  'that  the  power  of  the  King  of  Spain,  up  to  that  time 
so  formidable,  which  seemed  carrying  him  to  universal 
monarchy,  was  not  what  it  appeared,  and  that  France  had, 
on  the  contrary,  resources  inexhaustible  and  hitherto  un- 
recognized, arising  from  the  union  of  all  its  parts,  from  its 
great  fertility,  and  from  the  infinite  number  of  soldiers 
always  at  hand;  so  that  one  can  say  without  exaggeration 
that  France  well  governed  can  achieve  greater  things  than 
any  other  power  in  the  world." 

The  dreaded  minister  did  not  love  power  alone;  he  had 
also  an  inclination  for  arts  and  letters.  Several  useful  insti- 


266  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE. 

tutions  date  from  his  ministry.  He  founded  the  French 
Academy  in  1635,  and  intended  it  to  govern  the  language  and 
to  regulate  taste;  he  enlarged  the  Sorbonne,  the  Royal 
Library  and  Printing  House;  he  erected  the  Palais  Cardinal 
(Palais  Royal),  the  College  of  Plessis,  and  instituted  the 
Botanical  Garden,  to-day  the  Museum  of  Natural  History. 
He  showed  to  writers  a  deference  to  which  they  had  not 
been  accustomed;  he  granted  pensions  to  scholars  and 
poets,  to  Corneille  among  others;  he  encouraged  Voue't, 
the  painter,  and  he  recalled  Poussin  from  Rome;  finally, 
he  saw  the  birth  of  the  great  literary  century  of  France  just 
as  he  himself  had  begun  the  great  political  era;  for  "The  Cid" 
belongs  to  the  year  1635  and  the  "Discourse  on  Method"  to 
1637.  He  was  himself  a  remarkable  writer.  If  he  was 
wrong  in  writing  tragedies  and  in  considering  himself  the 
equal  of  Corneille  he  composed  a  multitude  of  works  on 
theology,  highly  esteemed  in  his  own  times,  and  his 
"Memoirs,"  a  political  testament  much  valued  in  our  day. 
In  these  writings  the  emphasis  and  the  pretentious  style  of 
the  period  are  often  noticed,  but  sometimes  also  an  energy 
like  that  of  Corneille. 

Louis  XIII.  made  no  change  in  the  policy  of  the  car- 
dinal, and  summoned  to  his  council  one  who  was  capable  of 
continuing  it,  Jules  Mazarin,  the  friend  and  depositary  of 
the  great  minister's  ideas.  Louis  survived  Richelieu  only 
six  months  (May  14,  1643). 


CHAPTER   XVIII. 
THE   THIRTY   YEARS'   WAR. 


The  Northern  Countries  and  Germany  at  the  Time  of  the  Thirty  Years' 
War. — The  Thirty  Years'  War  :  The  Palatine  and  Danish  Periods 
(1618-26)  ;  the  Swedish  and  French  Periods  (1630-48). 


IN  the  sixteenth  century  the  political  balance  had  not  yet 

begun  to  change  in  the  North,  although  by  certain  signs  one 

..         could  already  foresee  that  Russia  was  rising 

The    northern  ,  ,        ,   J  .    ,  .  _.  . 

countries  and  and  Poland  sinking.  1  he  one,  in  fact,  was 
£mTanoyf at  the  gradually  gaining  strength  under  the  hand  of 
Thirty  Years'  the  dukes  of  Moscow  and  their  absolute 
authority;  the  other,  at  the  extinction  of  the 
Jagellons  in  1572,  was  becoming  an  elective  kingdom,  or 
rather  an  aristocratic,  turbulent  republic,  which  conferred 
the  kingly  title  upon  that  foreign  prince  of  whom  she  was  the 
least  suspicious.  Thus  it  was  that  in  1573  she  had  elected  the 
Duke  of  Anjou,  who  was  afterward  the  unfortunate  Henry 
III.  of  France,  and  after  he  had  fled  from  Warsaw  Stephen 
Battory,  Prince  of  Transylvania  (1575);  finally,  in  1587, 
Sigismund,  son  of  John  III.,  King  of  Sweden.  Sigismund 
was  deprived  by  his  uncle,  Charles  IX.,  of  his  father's 
crown.  In  order  to  regain  it  he  made  alliance  with  Austria, 
and  in  1598  began  a  war  between  Poland  and  Sweden, 
which  continued  till  1629,  when  Richelieu  interposed  for  its 
cessation.  Livonia  and  Prussia  were  the  chief  theater  of 
the  war,  but  Russia  also  took  part.  The  Polish  nobility 
preserved  a  military  vigor  which  made  it  appear  with  honor 
in  these  long  contentions.  Russia,  on  the  contrary,  troubled 
by  weakening  civil  dissensions  in  the  period  between  the 
extinction  of  the  male  line  of  Ruric  (1598)  and  the  acces- 
sion of  the  Romanoffs  (1613),  lost  the  advantages  which 
she  owed  to  Ivan  IV.  By  the  peace  of  Stolbova  (1617)  she 
surrendered  to  Sweden  Carelia  and  Ingria,  that  is  to  say, 
she  gave  up  all  her  right  to  the  Baltic;  at  the  treaty  of 

267 


268  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

Divilina  in  1618  she  restored  to  Poland  Smolensk  and 
Tchernigov,  thereby  being  crowded  back  into  those  deserts 
whence  she  was  already  attempting  to  emerge.  At  that 
moment,  therefore,  when  the  Thirty  Years'  War  was  break- 
ing out  in  Germany,  Sigismund  had  gloriously  defended  his 
claim  to  the  crown  of  Poland,  but  he  had  not  recovered  the 
crown  of  Sweden,  which  since  1611  had  been  worn  by  his 
cousin,  Gustavus  Adolphus,  grandson  of  the  glorious 
founder  of  the  house  of  Vasa. 

Gustavus  Vasa  had  established  in  Sweden  the  almost 
absolute  authority  of  the  king  and  the  Lutheran  reforma- 
tion. The  latter,  menaced  by  his  son,  John  III.,  by  the 
intrigues  of  the  King  of  Spain,  Philip  II.,  and  by  the  attacks 
of  the  Polish  king,  Sigismund,  took  root  in  the  country  and 
developed  that  fanatically  intolerant  spirit  of  which  it  still 
furnishes  such  deplorable  proofs.  Another  result  of  the 
hostilities  between  Sweden  and  Poland  was  that,  since  the 
latter  had  b«en  aided  by  Austria,  the  former  was  naturally 
led  to  take  up  arms  against  the  house  of  Hapsburg,  when 
the  imperial  troops  arrived  on  the  shores  of  the  Baltic. 
The  force  that  royalty  had  gained  in  Sweden  and  the  energy 
of  Lutheran  sentiment  with  which  the  Swedes  were  ani- 
mated, together  with  the  talents  of  Gustavus  and  the  faults 
of  his  adversaries,  will  explain  to  us  the  brilliant  part  that 
Sweden  shortly  played  upon  the  German  territory. 

Denmark  did  not  possess  these  advantages.  In  1618 
her  king,  Charles  IV.,  was  not  a  remarkable  ruler,  and  the 
government  was  weak  because  it  was  subject  to  a  sort  of 
oligarchy  formed  by  the  high  nobility.  Moreover,  if  the 
Danish  navy  was  respectable  the  land  forces  were  not,  since 
they  were  feudal  levies  which  the  lords  controlled  much 
more  than  the  king.  Although  possessor  of  Norway  and 
the  southern  provinces  of  Sweden,  Denmark  could  not  win 
credit  in  the  great  conflict  in  store. 

When  Charles  V.,  fallen  from  the  height  of  his  hopes,  had 
determined,  in  the  middle  of  the  century  preceding,  to 
renounce  his  crowns  he  had  first  promulgated  the  peace  of 
Augsburg  in  order  to  end  the  religious  wars  in  Germany 
(1555).  This  peace  could  be  nothing  but  a  truce;  for  the 
great  questions  remained  unsolved.  German  slowness 
allowed  this  truce  to  continue  sixty-three  years. 

The  new  war  was  to  arise  from  the  clause  containing  the 
ecclesiastical  reservation.  This  forbade  ecclesiastical  bene- 


CHAP.  XVIII.]       THE  THIRTY  YEARS'   WAR.  269 

ficiaries  who  joined  the  Protestant  party  to  carry  with  them 
the  large  estates  of  which  the  Church  had  given  them  the 
temporary  administration.  This  was  just;  but  the  seculari- 
zations, which  made  hereditary  property  of  estates  held  in 
usufruct,  had  procured  more  proselytes  for  Luther  among 
the  nobles  than  his  most  spirited  dissertations  against  the 
court  of  Rome.  Before  him  the  Catholic  Church  owned  in 
landed  property  a  third  of  Germany;  the  abbots  and  bishops 
were  princes.  What  temptation  did  they  not  experience  to 
keep  for  themselves  those  immense  estates  that  the  Church 
had  intrusted  to  their  charge  in  order  to  meet  the  expenses 
of  worship  and  relieve  the  poor!  What  a  temptation  also 
had  the  temporal  princes  to  lay  hands  upon  this  rich  prey, 
thus  reducing  the  clergy  to  the  poverty  of  apostolic  days! 

Thus  in  the  north  of  Germany  the  Protestants  invaded 
the  archbishoprics  of  Magdeburg  and  Bremen,  the  bishoprics 
of  Minden,  Halberstadt,  Verden,  and  Lubeck.  But  in  the 
west  and  south  the  Catholic  opposition  was  greater.  In 
1582  Gebhard  of  Truchsess,  Archbishop  of  Cologne,  and  as 
such  one  of  the  seven  electors  of  the  empire,  and  Duke  of 
Westphalia,  renounced  Catholicism,  married,  but  intended 
to  keep  the  electorate.  The  Pope  declared  his  rights  for- 
feited and  appointed  a  new  archbishop,  who  was  installed  in 
possession  of  Cologne  by  a  body  of  Spanish  troops.  Geb- 
hard had  counted  upon  the  Protestants;  but  as  he  had 
embraced  Calvinism  the  Lutherans  deserted  him  and  he 
lost  his  duchy  (1584). 

Here  the  Reformers  were  beaten;  so  too  they  were  in  1589 
at  Aix-la-Chapelle,  whence  their  ministers  were  driven  out; 
at  Strasburg,  where  they  tried  in  vain  to  invest  one  of  their 
own  number  with  the  bishopric  (1592);  at  Donauwerth 
(1607),  from  which  the  Protestants  were  expelled  and  which 
fell  from  the  rank  of  a  free  town  to  that  of  a  simple  munici- 
pality of  the  duchy  of  Bavaria. 

Thus  was  accomplished  the  scheme  of  Catholic  resto- 
ration undertaken  in  Germany  by  the  Holy  See.  The 
Protestants,  frightened  by  all  the  blows  which  they  had 
received,  finally  thought  of  defending  themselves  by  organi- 
zing their  forces.  In  1608  they  concluded  the  Evangelical 
Union.  Their  adversaries  were  unwilling  to  remain  un- 
armed in  the  face  of  such  a  threat,  and  formed  on  their 
side  the  following  year  the  Catholic  League,  under  the 
direction  of  Duke  Maximilian  of  Bavaria. 


270  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

This  prince  had  early  shown  a  fierce  and  implacable 
hatred  against  the  Reformation.  When  six  years  old  he 
wrote  to  his  mother  after  the  murder  of  Henry  III.  by 
Jacques  Clement:  "With  unspeakable  pleasure  I  have 
heard  of  the  assassination  of  the  King  of  France.  I  am 
awaiting  impatiently  the  confirmation  of  this  news."  Next 
to  him  the  most  influential  member  of  the  league  was  Arch- 
duke Ferdinand  of  Styria,  afterward  emperor,  who  declared 
that  he  would  beg  his  bread  rather  than  tolerate  heresy  in 
his  domains.  He  had  banished  the  Protestant  ministers;  he 
caused  their  churches  to  be  blown  up  with  powder,  and 
10,000  of  their  Bibles  to  be  burned  at  once.  Then  upon 
the  place  of  execution  he  had  laid  the  corner  stone  of  a 
Capuchin  monastery.  To  confront  such  men  the  Protestant 
party,  already  weakened  by  the  religious  hatred  of  the 
Lutherans  for  the  Calvinists  and  of  the  Lutherans  among 
themselves,  had  no  remarkable  prince.  The  leaders 
afforded  Germany  the  spectacle  of  the  most  scandalous 
rivalries.  The  Duke  of  Neuburg  had  become  a  Catholic 
to  acquire  Cleves  and  Juliers  after  that  rich  succession 
became  open  (1609);  the  Elector  of  Brandenburg  turned 
Calvinist  for  the  same  motive.  The  one  called  in  the 
Spaniards,  the  other  the  Dutch.  Henry  IV.  was  about 
to  intervene  when  he  was  assassinated.  . 

The  house  of  Austria  was  not  in  a  condition  to  profit  by 
these  dissensions  in  Germany  and  in  the  Reformation.  Also, 
as  we  have  just  seen,  not  in  the  Austrian  hereditary  states  but 
in  Bavaria,  Catholicism  resuming  the  offensive  had  found  its 
point  of  support.  Since  the  death  of  Ferdinand  I.  (1564), 
brother  of  Charles  V.  and  his  successor  in  the  empire,  the 
German  branch  of  this  house  had  abandoned  to  the  Spanish 
branch  the  great  role  in  Europe.  The  attacks  of  the  Otto- 
mans, the  insubordination  of  the  Hungarians  and  Bohe- 
mians, finally,  the  division  of  the  possessions  of  Ferdinand  I. 
among  his  sons,  had  thrown  this  house  back  into  the  posi- 
tion from  which  Charles  V.  had  caused  it  to  emerge. 
Though  the  imperial  crown  was  retained,  it  borrowed  no 
less  strength  than  it  conferred.  Maximilian  II.  (1564-76), 
an  enlightened  and  prudent  prince,  had  been  constantly 
occupied  by  the  Ottomans,  the  Transylvanians,  and  the 
affairs  of  Poland,  where  he  wished  to  be  chosen  king  after 
the  flight  of  Henry  III.;  he  troubled  himself  very  little  about 
Germany,  where,  however,  he  preached  to  the  Reformers 


CHAP.  XVIII.]       THE  THIRTY  YEARS'    WAR.  271 

without  being  heeded  the  toleration  that  he  himself  practiced. 
His  son,  Rudolph  II.  (1576-1612),  was,  on  the  contrary, 
Aveak,  incapable,  and  superstitious.  He  passed  his  life 
with  alchemists  and  astronomers  who  were  still  astrologers, 
although  Tycho  Brahe  was  among  their  number.  While 
he  was  observing  the  stars  and  drawing  up  the  Rudolphine 
tables  his  armies  were  being  beaten  by  the  Ottomans  and 
he  was  losing  his  crowns.  His  brother,  Mathias,  under  the 
pretext  that  he  was  endangering  the  fortune  of  their  house, 
took  up  arms,  and  in  1608  forced  the  cession  to  himself  of 
Hungary,  Austria,  and  Moravia,  with  the  title  of  King-elect 
of  Bohemia. 

This  domestic  quarrel  rendered  the  Protestants  more 
daring  in  the  hereditary  provinces.  Mathias  granted  them 
freedom  of  worship  in  Austria;  Rudolph  was  constrained 
by  a  formidable  uprising  of  the  Bohemians  to  sign  letters 
patent  by  which  he  recognized  the  legal  existence  of  a  Bohe- 
mian confession  formulated  in  1575  ;  he  granted  the  Protes- 
tants the  right  of  opening  schools  and  of  building  churches, 
and,  a  matter  of  graver  import,  permitted  them  to  appoint 
permanent  officers,  charged,  under  the  name  of  defenders 
of  the  faith,  with  superintending  the  execution  of  the  letters 
patent  (July  u,  1609).  In  1611  Mathias  forced  his  brother 
to  resign  to  him  the  crown  of  Bohemia.  To  Rudolph  was 
left  only  that  of  the  empire,  which  the  electors  were  about 
to  take  away  when  he  died. 

Mathias  was  neither  more  clever  nor  more  powerful. 
Against  him  was  done  what  he  had  done  against  Rudolph. 
Upon  him  was  imposed  as  coadjutor  and  heir  the  Archduke 
Ferdinand  of  Styria,  whose  superior  energy  we  have  already 
noticed.  The  momentary  tolerance  that  the  Protestants 
had  enjoyed  in  the  hereditary  states  was  followed  by 
persecution.  They  were  driven  from  their  offices,  deprived 
of  their  churches,  and  as  soon  as  Austria  was  freed  from 
heresy  Ferdinand  openly  announced  his  purpose  of  crush- 
ing the  religious  liberties  of  Bohemia. 

In  1618  some  utraquists,  or  partakers  of  both  bread  and 

wine  in  the   Lord's  Supper,  wished  to  build  churches  for 

The      Thirty   tndr   worship    and    were    prevented.      The 

Years'      War :   defenders  of  the  faith,  having  at  their  head 

The        Palatine     ,,        -,  c    „,  , 

and  Danish  Pe-  the  Count  of  Thum,  an  impetuous  and  vio- 
riods  (1618-36).  lent  man,  pleaded  the  letters  patent.  Upon 
receiving  a  derisive  answer  the  riot  broke  out.  They 


272  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

repaired  to  the  city  hall  of  Prague,  and,  "according  to  an 
ancient  custom  of  Bohemia,"  threw  the  governors  out  of 
the  windows  (May  23,  1618). 

This  event  marks  the  beginning  of  the  memorable  so- 
called  Thirty  Years'  War,  which  extended  its  ravages  from 
the  Danube  to  the  Scheldt,  from  the  banks  of  the  Po  to  the 
shores  of  the  Baltic,  which  ruined  the  towns,  devastated  the 
fields,  carrying  off  the  population  and  bringing  back  bar- 
barism. Brought  about  by  a  multitude  of  circumstances,  it 
began  in  a  religious  question,  the  struggle  between  the  two 
religions,  but  it  ended  in  a  political  issue,  the  humiliation 
of  the  house  of  Austria  and  the  aggrandizement  of  the 
house  of  France. 

After  the  window  exploit  of  Prague  the  Bohemians 
organized  for  defense  and  chose  for  their  king  the  Elector 
Palatine,  chief  of  the  Evangelical  Union,  son-in-law  of  the 
King  of  England  and  nephew  of  the  Stadtholder  of  Holland 
(1619).  But  Frederick  V.  cared  only  for  festivals,  while  Fer- 
dinand II.,  who  had  become  emperor  at  the  death  of  Mathias 
(1619),  displayed  the  greatest  activity;  he  treated  with  the 
King  of  Poland,  who  sent  him  assistance,  and  with  the  Elec- 
tor of  Saxony,  who  gave  no  aid  to  the  Bohemians;  he 
obtained  subsidies  from  the  Pope  and  soldiery  from  the 
Catholic  League  and  from  the  King  of  Spain,  the  head  of 
his  house.  Besieged  in  Vienna  by  the  Bohemians  of  the 
Count  of  Thurn  and  by  the  Hungarians  of  Bethlen  Gabor, 
menaced  almost  in  his  own  cabinet  by  the  members  of  the 
States  of  Austria,  who  wished  to  force  him  to  capitulate,  he 
withstood  all  these  attacks,  and  his  firmness  gave  time  for 
all  the  re-enforcements  of  the  league  to  hasten  thither. 
Their  arrival  changed  the  face  of  things;  the  citizens 
armed,  confidence  was  restored,  and  the  Count  of  Thurn, 
recalled  to  Bohemia  by  a  defeat  of  his  colleague,  Ernest  of 
Mansfield,  raised  the  siege  of  Vienna. 

At  the  same  time  a  French  embassy  sent  by  de  Luynes 
had  decided  Gabor  to  sign  a  truce;  it  rendered  another 
service  to  the  emperor  by  persuading  the  princes  of  the 
Evangelical  Union  to  abandon  the  Elector  Palatine.  Thus 
de  Luynes  managed  the  foreign  affairs  of  France. 

The  emperor  could  then  assume  the  offensive  against  his 
only  remaining  enemy.  While  the  Spaniards  were  entering 
the  Palatinate  and  the  Saxons  Lusatia,  the  army  of  the 
league  triumphed  over  the  Bohemians  at  the  battle  of  White 


CHAP.  XVIII.]       THE  THIRTY  YEARS'   WAR.  273 

Mountain  near  Prague  (1620).  Forced  to  demand  pardon 
and  despoiled  of  her  privileges,  Bohemia  in  terror  beheld 
the  punishment  of  the  leaders  of  the  insurrection:  27  were 
beheaded;  29  escaped  the  same  fate  only  by  flight;  928 
lords  were  deprived  of  their  property;  38,000  families 
departed  from  the  country,  where  the  Reformation  was  pro- 
scribed. Two  centuries  later  Bohemia  still  suffered  from 
this  cruel  restoration  of  Catholicism. 

Meanwhile  the  unfortunate  elector,  put  under  the  ban  of 
the  empire  (1621),  fled  to  Holland,  not  daring  to  defend 
even  his  hereditary  state,  where  the  Spaniards  of  Spinola 
established  themselves.  This  success  revived  the  ambition 
of  the  courts  of  Vienna  and  Madrid.  The  former  schemes 
of  Charles  V.  and  Philip  II.  were  resumed;  the  reduction 
of  Holland  and  of  Protestantism  was  dreamed  of;  soon 
they  were  to  dream  of  the  destruction  of  German  liberty. 

But  a  man  who  possessed  only  his  sword  championed  the 
cause  of  Ferderick  V.  The  violences  committed  in  Bohemia 
by  Ferdinand  furnished  an  army  to  the  Count  of  Mansfield. 
So  many  men  were  ruined  that  war  seemed  their  only  resource. 
At  the  head  of  20,000  adventurers  who  had  pillage  as  pay- 
ment Mansfield  escaped  through  Bohemia  and  the  upper 
Palatinate  from  the  pursuit  of  the  Bavarian  general  Tilly, 
traversed  all  Franconia,  penetrating  to  the  Rhenish  Palati- 
nate, where  the  elector  hastened  to  join  him.  He  defeated 
the  Spaniards  and  Tilly  himself  at  Mingelsheim  (1622). 
But  the  Spaniards  and  Tilly  united  their  forces,  while 
Mansfeld  and  the  Burggrave  of  Baden-Durlach  separated. 
The  latter  was  worsted  at  Wimpfen  in  Hesse.  Christian  of 
Brunswick,  another  adventurer,  who  pillaged  churches,  and 
melting  the  shrines  of  the  saints  struck  off  coins  whereon 
these  words  formed  the  legend,  "Friend  of  God,  Enemy  of 
Priests,"  levied  20,000  men  in  the  north  of  Germany  and 
wished  to  join  Mansfield;  the  combined  army  checked  his 
progress  and  defeated  him  at  Hochst  on  the  Main.  The 
Palatinate  was  again  lost.  Mansfield  opened  himself  a  pas- 
sage to  the  frontiers  of  Champagne,  which  he  did  not  dare 
to  cross,  and  then  to  the  Netherlands.  There  he  rejoined 
Brunswick,  who  fought  against  the  Spaniards  the  bloody 
battle  of  Fleurus,  in  which,  being  severely  wounded,  he  had 
his  arm  cut  off  in  the  sight  of  his  army  to  the  sound  of 
drums  and  trumpets.  Aided  by  the  Dutch,  they  forced  the 
Spaniards  to  raise  the  siege  of  Berg-op-Zoom.  Mansfield 


274  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

then  penetrated  into  Westphalia,  which  he  ravaged,  and 
into  West  Friesland,  where  he  fortified  himself  so  strongly 
that  Tilly  despaired  of  driving  him  out;  then  he  passed 
over  into  France  and  England,  seeking  everywhere  enemies 
for  Austria  and  means  for  fighting  against  her. 

However,  the  diet  of  Ratisbon  sanctioned  the  spoliation  of 
Frederick  V.  The  Upper  Palatinate,  between  the  Danube 
and  the  Bohemian  mountains,  with  the  dignity  of  elector 
was  transferred  to  Maximilian  of  Bavaria,  and  the  Spanish 
troops  remained  in  possession  of  the  Lower  Palatinate  upon 
the  Rhine  (1623).  Christian  of  Brunswick,  who  tried  to 
continue  the  campaign,  was  again  defeated  at  Stadtloen 
in  the  bishopric  of  Munster  and  was  forced  back  into 
Holland. 

Owing  to  the  discords  of  the  German  princes  and  to  the 
hesitations  of  the  electors  of  Saxony  and  Brandenburg, 
the  Reformation  was  in  danger.  The  Protestants,  how- 
ever, who  had  abandoned  the  Elector  Palatine,  began  to 
understand  that  his  cause  was  theirs,  and  that  their  ruin 
would  follow  close  upon  his.  The  Elector  of  Brandenburg 
opened  negotiations  with  Sweden;  before  these  had  come 
to  a  result  the  King  of  Denmark  entered  the  empire  so  as 
not  to  leave  to  Gustavus  Adolphus  the  great  role  of  pro- 
tector of  the  German  Reformation.  Holland  and  England 
promised  him  the  support  of  their  fleets  and  supplies. 
Richelieu  secretly  sent  him  money.  Christian  IV.,  invited 
by  the  States  of  Lower  Saxony,  crossed  the  Elbe  at  Stade 
(1625),  and  during  the  first  campaign  held  the  country 
between  that  river  and  the  Weser,  without  Tilly's  daring  to 
attack  him  there.  The  following  year  another  enemy  arose 
in  his  rear. 

A  Bohemian  nobleman,  Wallenstein,  perfecting  the  system 
devised  by  Mansfield  of  maintaining  an  army  without  pay, 
had  equipped  50,000  men  in  the  name  of  the  emperor. 
Ferdinand  had  up  to  this  time  sustained  the  war  with  only 
the  troops  of  the  Catholic  League;  Tilly  was  commander 
in  the  name  of  the  Duke  of  Bavaria;  the  orders  for  the  mili- 
tary operations  emanated  from  the  court  of  Munich,  and 
the  management  of  affairs  was  subordinated  to  the  interests 
of  Maximilian  and  his  allies,  not  to  the  views  of  the  house 
of  Austria.  Moreover,  the  war,  begun  in  the  interests  of 
religion,  was  now  assuming  a  political  character.  At  first 
Ferdinand  II.  combated  only  against  heresy;  he  intended  to 


CHAP.  XVIII.]       THE   THIRTY  YEARS'   WAR.  275 

make  use  of  the  victories  won  in  the  name  of  religion  for 
regaining  the  authority  in  the  empire  that  Charles  V.  had 
temporarily  seized.  Wallenstein  offered  him  the  means  of 
accomplishing  this.  While  Tilly  was  attacking  the  Danes 
in  the  west,  and  was  partially  destroying  the  royal  army  at 
Lutter  in  the  duchy  of  Brunswick,  Wallenstein  defeated 
Mansfield  at  Dessau  near  the  junction  of  the  Mulde  and 
Elbe,  pursued  him  through  Silesia,  and  forced  him  back  into 
Hungary.  Coldly  received  by  Bethlen  Gabor,  Prince  of 
Transylvania,  whom  he  expected  to  find  in  arms  ready  to 
join  him,  the  adventurer,  broken  down  by  fatigue  and 
disease,  went  to  die  in  a  village  of  Bosnia,  but  wished  to 
expire  standing  (1626).  Wallenstein  then  returned  against 
the  Danes;  he  defeated  the  Margrave  of  Baden-Durlach  at 
Hilligenhagen  in  Wagria,  and  took  possession  of  almost  all 
of  Holstein;  he  made  an  ineffectual  attack  upon  the  Hanse- 
atic  town  of  Stralsund,  the  capture  of  which  would  have 
given  him  the  control  of  the  Baltic.  Christian  profited  by  a 
few  partial  advantages  to  conclude  peace  at  Lubeck  and  to 
avert  his  own  ruin  by  abandonment  of  his  allies  (May  22, 
1626). 

Never  had  the  imperial  power  been  more  threatening. 
Wallenstein,  invested  with  the  duchy  of  Mecklenburg  and 
with  the  title  of  Admiral  of  the  Baltic,  was  occupying  the 
north  of  Germany  with  100,000  men,  and  was  forcibly  caus- 
ing the  execution  of  the  edict  of  restitution.  On  March  6, 
1629,  Ferdinand  had  proclaimed  that  celebrated  act  by 
which  all  the  convents  and  all  the  ecclesiastical  property 
secularized  since  the  peace  of  Augsburg,  or  appropriated  to 
Protestant  worship,  was  to  be  restored  to  its  original  pur- 
pose. This  act  was  a  grave  mistake;  by  disclosing  too 
quickly  the  secret  designs  of  the  house  of  Austria,  it  became 
for  it  the  cause  of  a  long  series  of  misfortunes.  The 
Catholics,  whom  this  measure  had  at  first  filled  with  joy, 
were  not  tardy,  in  fact,  in  understanding  its  import  when 
they  saw  the  emperor  give  to  one  of  his  own  sons  four  bish- 
oprics at  once,  and  deliver  to  the  Jesuits  a  large  part  of  the 
restored  property,  instead  of  giving  it  back  to  its  former 
owners.  Wallenstein  said  openly  "that  there  was  no  need 
of  more  electors  and  princes,  but  that  everything  should  be 
submitted  to  the  control  of  a  single  king,  as  in  France  and 
Spain." 

But  Richelieu  was  watching  a  scheme  which  alarmed  him 


2 76  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

for  the  safety  of  France.  Already  in  Italy  he  had  foiled 
the  pretensions  of  the  house  of  Spain  upon  Yaltellina 
and  Mantua.  Even  when  all  his  attention  seemed  absorbed 
by  internal  affairs  he  did  not  cease  to  act  by  diplomacy, 
lavishing  the  gold  of  France  while  waiting  until  he  could  draw 
the  sword.  At  the  diet  of  Ratisbon  (1640)  through  the 
cleverness  of  Joseph,  his  emissary,  he  obtained  the  dis- 
missal of  Wallenstein,  against  whom  all  Germany  was  raising 
clamors,  and  none  the  less  he  caused  the  title  of  King  of  the 
Romans  to  be  refused  to  the  son  of  the  emperor,  which  had 
been  the  tacit  reward  for  Wallenstein 's  removal.  He 
accomplished  even  more.  At  the  time  when  Ferdinand 
deprived  himself  of  his  best  general,  and  reduced  his  army 
to  less  than  40,000  men,  the  King  of  Sweden,  summoned  by 
Richelieu,  landed  in  Pomerania  (1630). 

Sigismund,  King  of  Poland,  proud  of  his  successes  over 
the  Russians  and  of  the  part  that  in  1619  he  had  assumed 
of  protector  of  the  house  of  Austria,  had  again  begun  hos- 
tilities against  his  young  kinsman,  whom  he  styled  a  usurper. 
He  did  not  recognize  the  strength  of  him  who  was  to  be  the 
hero  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War.  Gustavus  took  Riga  in 
1621,  all  Livonia  in  1625,  and  a  portion  of  Prussia  the  year 
following.  But  in  1626  Sigismund  persuaded  Ferdinand  to 
return  the  assistance  which  the  latter  had  formerly  received 
from  him.  The  Austrian  troops  came  to  the  aid  of  the 
Poles,  and  Gustavus,  defeated  (1629),  found  himself  in  a 
difficult  position,  when  Richelieu,  aided  by  England  and 
Brandenburg,  persuaded  him  to  discontinue  that  fruitless 
war.  Jn  consequence  of  the  peace  of  Altmark  hostilities 
were  suspended  for  six  years;  Livonia  and  the  coast  of 
Prussia  remained  in  the  hands  of  Sweden  (September,  1629). 
•  Gustavus  was  now  free;  Richelieu  threw  him  on  Ger- 
many, granting  him  an  annual  subsidy  of  1,200,000  francs, 
and  to  excite  his  ardor  showing  him  immense  spoils  to  capture, 
his  co-religionists  to  avenge,  and  a  great  role  to  play  upon 
a  resounding  theater  (treaty  of  Berwald,  January,  1631). 

Gustavus  Adolphus  appeared  in  the  empire  like  a  thunder- 
bolt of  war;  he  invented  new  tactics  which  threw  his  adver- 
saries into  confusion;  in  a  few  months  he 

The  Swedish  .        .  .  ',  ,      ,         ..    „ 

and       French     gained  possession  of  the  whole  of  Pomerania 
Periods   (1630-     (1630).     The  Protestant  electors  of  Branden- 
burg and  Saxony  wished  to  extort  concessions 
from  Ferdinand  II.  without  owing  them  to  a  foreign  prince, 


CHAP.  XVIII.]       THE  THIRTY  YEARS'   WAR.  277 

they  refused  to  open  to  Gustavus  their  states  and  fortresses, 
which  he  needed  to  support  his  offensive  operations  and  to 
secure  his  communications  with  Sweden.  Magdeburg, 
which  the  imperial  troops  were  besieging,  was  lost  by  their 
hesitation,  for  Gustavus  Adolphus  could  not  save  it,  and 
Tilly  treated  it  with  terrible  ferocity  (May,  1631).  This  great 
disaster  at  last  decided  the  electors ;  Gustavus  Adolphus, 
free  to  pursue  the  imperial  troops,  defeated  them  at  Brei- 
tenfeld  near  Leipsic  (September).  While  the  Saxons 
were  marching  through  Bohemia  upon  Vienna  he  himself 
aroused  or  subjugated  the  western  provinces,  the  ecclesias- 
tical electorates,  Franconia,  and  the  Palatinate.  When  he 
had  thus  separated  the  Spaniards  from  the  imperial  troops, 
he  returned  against  the  latter  to  attack  them  in  the  very 
center  of  their  strength.  He  took  possession  of  Donau- 
werth,  which  opened  to  him  Bavaria;  he  forced  the  passage 
of  the  Lech  in  an  artillery  engagement  in  which  Tilly  was 
mortally  wounded,  and  entered  Munich  (April,  1632). 
Duke  Maximilian,  concealed  in  his  castle,  hopelessly 
awaited  the  fate  which  he  had  inflicted  on  the  Count  Palatine. 

Ferdinand  II.,  menaced  by  the  sight  of  the  Swedes  and 
Saxons  reuniting  under  the  walls  of  Vienna,  submitted  to 
the  humiliation  of  resorting  to  the  general  whom  he  had 
removed;  but  he  triumphed  over  the  premeditated  hesita- 
tion of  Wallenstein  only  by  granting  him  the  supreme  com- 
mand. Thanks  to  his  reputation,  which  had  even  increased 
during  his  retirement,  the  celebrated  general  soon  recruited 
an  army;  without  difficulty  he  drove  the  Saxons  from 
Bohemia,  and  then  marched  upon  Gustavus  Adolphus 
through  Eger,  where  Duke  Maximilian  had  just  brought  him 
the  wreck  of  his  army.  The  two  adversaries,  upon  whom 
the  whole  of  Europe  fixed  its  gaze,  finally  met  at  Nurem- 
berg; six  weeks  they  remained  face  to  face.  Wallenstein 
was  wearied  first  and  withdrew  to  Saxony;  Gustavus  fol- 
lowed him  there.  At  Lutzen  they  closed  in  battle.  At  the 
beginning  of  the  engagement  the  king  was  struck  dead;  his 
best  pupil,  the  Duke  Bernard  of  Saxe-Weimar,  however, 
completed  the  victory  (November,  1632). 

But  the  divisions  which  broke  out  between  the  Protestants 
and  the  Swedes  rendered  it  useless;  the  Imperialists  again 
everywhere  took  the  offensive,  and  Ferdinand  II.  thought 
that  he  no  longer  needed  the  general  to  whom  he  owed  his 
throne,  but  whose  ambition  he  feared;  Wallenstein  was  as- 


2  7  8  THE  A  SCENDA  NC  Y  OF  FRA  NCE.  [BOOK  V. 

sassinated  at  Egerat  the  very  time  his  astrologer  was  promis- 
ing him  the  crown  of  Bohemia  (February,  1634).  His  succes- 
sors, Piccolomini,  Galas,  John  of  Werth,  with  his  army  gained 
a  victory  over  the  Swedes  and  Bernard  at  Nordlingen 
(September).  Twelve  thousand  of  their  men  were  killed, 
6000  captured,  together  with  the  Duke  of  Horn,  one  of  their 
best  generals,  and  they  were  hurled  back,  some  upon  the 
Rhine,  some  toward  Pomerania.  The  German  princes 
once  again  gave  up  the  struggle ;  the  treaty  of  Prague,  ac- 
cepted by  the  Elector  of  Saxony,  sanctioned  with  a  few 
exceptions  the  edict  of  restitution  (May,  1635). 

Then  France  herself  intervened  in  the  Thirty  Years'  War. 
"For  others  the  world!"  cried  Gustavus  Adolphus  when 
he  fell  at  Lutzen.  Richelieu  gathered  up  the  hopes  and 
the  fortune  of  the  young  hero.  Now  he  was  free  from  his 
chief  anxieties  at  home  and  could  turn  his  attention  and 
strength  abroad.  In  the  struggle  against  the  house  of 
Austria  he  boldly  substituted  France,  full  of  youth  and 
ardor,  for  exhausted  Denmark  and  for  Sweden  bereft  of  her 
king.  Against  Austria  and  Spain  more  closely  united  he 
first  wove  a  solid  knot  of  alliances.  By  the  convention  of 
Paris  he  promised  the  German  confederates  12,000  men,  who 
in  return  gave  over. Alsace  as  surety  (November,  1634),  and 
by  that  of  St.  Germain  he  purchased  Bernard  of  Saxe- 
Weimar  and  his  army  (October,  1635);  at  Compiegne  he 
negotiated  with  the  Chancellor  of  Sweden,  Oxenstiern,  an- 
other great  minister  (April,  1635);  at  Wesel,  with  the  Land- 
grave of  Hesse-Cassel,  who  promised  troops  in  return  for  a 
subsidy  (October,  1636);  at  Paris,  with  the  Dutch  for  the 
division  of  the  Netherlands  (February,  1635);  at  Rivoli,  with 
the  Swiss,  and  the  dukes  of  Savoy,  Mantua  and  Parma  (July). 

These  numerous  treaties  announce  the  extent  the  war  was 
going  to  cover.  Richelieu  was  to  carry  it  along  all  the 
French  frontiers:  in  the  Netherlands  in  order  to  share  them 
with  Holland;  on  the  Rhine  in  order  to  protect  Champagne 
and  Lorraine  and  capture  Alsace;  into  Germany  to  hold 
out  a  hand  to  the  Swedes  and  break  the  omnipotence  of 
Austria;  into  Italy  to  maintain  the  authority  of  the  Grisons 
in  Valtellina  and  the  influence  of  France  in  Piedmont; 
toward  the  Pyrenees  to  conquer  Roussillon;  on  the  ocean  and 
the  Mediterranean  to  there  destroy  the  Spanish  fleets,  to 
uphold  the  revolts  of  Portugal  and  Catalonia,  and  to  threaten 
the  shores  of  Italy. 


CHAP.  XVIII.]       THE  THIRTY  YEARS'   WAR.  279 

The  pretext  of  the  rupture  was  the  seizure  by  the  Span- 
iards of  the  Archbishop  of  Treves,  who  had  put  himself 
under  the  protection  of  France.  The  war  began  favorably. 
In  the  Netherlands  Chatillon  and  Breze  gained  the  victory 
of  Avein  near  Liege  (May  5,  1635).  But  the  Dutch  were 
startled  at  seeing  the  French  so  near  them;  they  preferred 
enfeebled  Spain  for  a  neighbor  to  regenerated  France,  so 
they  poorly  seconded  the  French  operations.  The  Span- 
iards profited  by  this  misunderstanding.  Re-enforced  by 
10,000  Imperialists  under  Piccolomini,  they  penetrated  into 
Picardy  while  the  French  army  was  still  in  Holland,  crossed 
the  Somme,  and  made  themselves  masters  of  Corbie  (1636). 
For  an  instant  the  court  and  Paris  were  affrighted;  but 
courage  quickly  returned  to  the  great  city.  The  workmen 
and  the  people  volunteered  in  crowds,  the  burgesses  gave 
the  king  the  means  of  raising  and  supporting  12,000  foot 
soldiers  and  3000  horsemen  for  three  months.  Louis 
XIII. ,  more  daring  this  time  than  Richelieu,  had  refused 
to  withdraw  to  the  Loire;  at  the  head  of  40,000  men  he 
marched  to  drive  the  Spaniards  out  from  the  frontier  and 
recapture  Corbie.  There  the  cardinal  escaped  the  greatest 
danger  he  had  encountered  in  his  life  only  because  at  the 
moment  of  giving  the  signal  for  his  assassination  the  cour- 
age of  the  king's  brother  failed  (1636).  Another  invasion, 
attempted  in  Burgundy,  proved  as  unsuccessful.  Galas  and 
the  Duke  of  Lorraine  had  advanced  as  far  as  St.-Jean-de- 
Losne,  which  resisted  bravely ;  the  Count  of  Rantzau  forced 
them  to  retreat,  and  the  Duke  of  Saxe-Weimar  drove  them 
back  in  disorder  into  Comte. 

The  following  year  (1637)  Cardinal  de  la  Valette  took  the 
towns  of  the  upper  Sambre,  Cateau-Cambresis,  Landrecies, 
and  Maubeuge.  Richelieu  liked  to  intrust  commands  to 
the  priests,  more  accustomed  to  obedience.  His  ordinary 
admiral  was  Sourdis,  Archbishop  of  Bordeaux,  who  in  1638 
destroyed  a  Spanish  fleet  off  Fontarabia,  and  more  than 
once  ravaged  the  shores  of  the  kingdom  of  Naples  and  of 
Spain.  But  in  that  year  (1638)  the  great  successes  were 
upon  the  Rhine;  Bernard  of  Saxe-Weimar  defeated  the  Im- 
perialists at  Rhinfeld,  captured  their  general,  John  of 
Werth,  and  after  three  victories  carried  Vieux-Brisach  by 
assault.  He  dreamed  of  making  himself  sovereign  of  Alsace 
and  Brisgau,  when  he  died,  very  opportunely  for  France, 
which  inherited  his  conquest  and  his  army  (1639). 


280  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

Alsace  was  an  Austrian  province;  Artois,  which  belonged 
to  the  Spaniards,  was  invaded  during  the  next  campaign. 
Three  marshals,  La  Meilleraye,  Chatillon,  and  Chaulnes, 
besieged  Arras.  An  army  of  30,000  men,  commanded  by 
Beck  and  Lamboi,  hastened  for  its  deliverance.  The  mar- 
shals were  of  different  opinions;  the  one  wished  to  remain 
in  the  intrenchments,  the  other  to  go  out  from  the  lines  and 
give  battle.  The  matter  was  referred  to  Richelieu.  "When 
the  king,"  he  replied  to  them,  "intrusted  the  command  to 
you  he  thought  you  capable;  go  out  or  not  from  your  lines; 
you  answer  on  your  lives  for  the  capture  of  the  town."  A 
few  days  later  the  Spaniards  were  defeated,  and  Arras  was 
forced  (August,  1640).  It  was  the  second  province  taken 
from  the  house  of  Austria. 

At  the  same  time  France  fought  in  the  north  of  Italy. 
After  the  death  of  Victor  Amadeus  (1637)  his  brothers, 
Prince  Thomas  of  Carignano  and  Cardinal  Maurice,  had 
contended  with  his  widow,  Christine,  daughter  of  Henry  IV., 
for  the  regency  and  had  obtained  the  support  of  a  Spanish 
army.  Richelieu  sent  to  Piedmont  the  Count  of  Harcourt, 
who  gained  three  brilliant  victories  at  Casale,  Turin,  and 
Ivrea,  re-established  the  authority  of  the  queen  regent,  and 
by  a  skillful  treaty  brought  the  princes  of  Savoy  again  into 
the  French  alliance  (1640-42).  In  1635  the  Duke  of  Rohan 
had  once  more  expelled  the  Spaniards  from  Valtellina. 

Spain  acted  no  longer  on  the  offensive;  she  had  enough 
to  do  to  defend  herself  against  the  Catalans  and  the  Portu- 
guese, who  had  just  risen  in  arms  (1640).  The  cardinal  was 
no  stranger  to  these  revolts;  he  furnished  assistance  to  the 
new  King  of  Portugal,  John  of  Braganza,  and  induced  the 
Catalans  to  recognize  Louis  XIII.  as  Count  of  Barcelona 
and  Roussillon  (1641).  A  French  army  commanded  by  La 
Mothe-Hondancourt  entered  Catalonia  and  drove  out  the 
Spaniards;  another,  which  the  king  led  in  person,  took 
Perpignan,  and  added  Roussillon  to  France  (September, 
1642),  a  province  retained  to  this  day. 

Spain  being  kept  busy  at  home,  Austria  was  easier  to 
conquer  in  Germany.  After  the  defection  of  the  Elector  of 
Saxony  in  1635  the  Swedes  had  retired  as  far  as  Pomer- 
ania.  Re-enforced  by  a  few  troops  which  the  diet  of  Stock- 
holm withdrew  from  Poland,  and  freed  by  the  powerful 
diversion  of  France,  Baner,  the  second  Gustavus,  took  the 
offensive;  he  defeated  the  Imperialists  at  Wittstock  in 


CHAP.  XVIII.]       THE  THIRTY  YEARS'   WAR.  281 

Brandenburg  (1636),  at  Chemnitz  in  Saxony  (1639),  pene- 
trated into  Bohemia,  and,  aided  by  the  Count  of  Guebriant, 
one  of  the  most  clever  tacticians  of  the  time,  in  1641,  after 
crossing  the  Danube  on  the  ice,  almost  captured  the  diet  of 
the  empire  and  the  emperor  in  Ratisbon.  A  sudden  thaw 
saved  Ferdinand  III.,  and  some  months  later  a  malady 
delivered  him  from  his  formidable  adversary.  While 
Baner's  successor,  the  paralytic  Torstenson,  was  astonish- 
ing Europe  by  the  rapidity  of  his  operations  and  by  a  series 
of  brilliant  victories  at  Glogau  and  at  Schweidnitz  in 
Silesia,  and  at  Breitenfeld  in  Saxony  (1642),  Guebriant  was 
boldly  advancing  with  the  army  of  Weimar  into  the  west  of 
the  empire,  which  the  Swedes  were  attacking  in  the  north- 
east; he  gained  a  victory  over  Piccolomini  at  Wolfenbuttel 
(1631),  over  Lamboi  at  Kempen  in  the  electorate  of 
Cologne  (1642),  and  assisted  all  the  malcontents  of  Ger- 
many. 

The  death  of  Richelieu  emboldened  the  Spaniards;  they 
resumed  the  offensive  toward  Champagne,  and  besieged 
Rocroy  under  the  leadership  of  a  veteran  captain,  Don 
Francisco  de  Mellos,  hoping  by  the  capture  of  that  town 
to  reach  Paris  unhindered.  They  had  before  them  only  an 
army  inferior  in  number,  and  a  general  twenty-one  years  old, 
Louis  of  Bourbon,  then  Duke  of  Enghien,  later  the  great 
Conde.  The  armies  met  May  19,  1643.  The  two  wings, 
composed  of  cavalry,  joined  battle  before  the  center  could 
engage.  Conde,  at  the  head  of  his  right  wing,  routed  the 
cavalry  which  was  opposed  to  him,  and  learning  that  his 
left  wing  was  defeated  by  Mellos,  passed  boldly  behind  the 
Spanish  lines,  to  attack  in  the  rear  the  victorious  right  wing 
of  the  enemy  and  put  it  to  flight.  The  Spanish  infantry 
remained  unmoved.  He  turned  back  upon  it,  surrounded 
it,  attacked  it  three  times,  and  broke  its  ranks.  The  aged 
Count  of  Fuentes,  its  commander,  was  thrown  to  the  ground 
dead.  Conde  himself  received  five  musket  wounds  in  his 
arms. 

The  Duke  of  Enghien  followed  up  his  success  with  that 
fiery  spirit,  that  fortunate  daring,  which  were  in  keeping  with 
the  character  of  this  new  Alexander.  Each  year  was  marked 
by  a  victory.  After  the  Spaniards  were  driven  out  of  France 
he  rapidly  seized  Thionville  (August,  1643)  and  turned 
against  Austria  and  its  German  allies.  The  army  of 
Weimar  had  just  lost  its  skillful  general,  Guebriant,  before 


282  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

Rothweil,  which,  however,  it  had  taken,  and  by  imperfect 
obedience  to  several  leaders  had  allowed  itself  to  be  sur- 
prised by  the  Imperialists  at  Duttlingen  in  quarters  too 
widely  separated  from  each  other  (November  24).  Its 
remnants  were  brought  together  and  reorganized  by  Turenne, 
who  was  made  marshal.  Conde  brought  him  10,000  men. 
They  attacked  the  Bavarian  general  Mercy  under  the 
walls  of  Freiburg  in  Brisgau ;  the  conflict  was  twice 
renewed  on  different  days,  and  each  time  Conde  displayed 
the  most  brilliant  valor,  drawing  after  him  the  electrified 
French  (August  16,  1644).  However,  it  was  a  frightful 
massacre  rather  than  a  victory.  Mercy  withdrew  undis- 
turbed, but  he  acknowledged  himself  vanquished  by  allow- 
ing the  two  generals  to  take  Philippsburg,  Worms,  and 
Mayence,  and  thus  free  the  banks  of  the  Rhine  from  the 
enemy. 

While  Conde  was  returning  to  Paris  to  enjoy  popular  ap- 
plause Turenne  prepared  to  answer  the  summons  of  Tor- 
stenson,  who  had  appointed  a  rendezvous  with  him  under 
the  walls  of  Vienna.  This  daring  general  had  just  traversed 
the  whole  of  Germany  from  the  farthest  part  of  Moravia  to 
the  extremity  of  Jutland,  dragging  with  him  the  imperial 
army  of  Galas,  who  could  neither  foresee  nor  prevent  any- 
thing. Denmark  chastised,  Torstenson  had  turned  again 
against  Galas,  who  had  hoped  to  surround  him  in  the  pen- 
insula, had  defeated  him  at  Juterbock  in  Brandenburg 
(November,  1644),  had  destroyed  his  troops  and  over- 
whelmed another  imperial  army  at  Jankowitz  in  Bohemia 
(February,  1645).  Then  it  was  that,  having  returned  to 
Moravia,  he  besieged  Brunn,  threatened  Vienna,  and  invited 
Turenne  to  come  and  join  htm  in  the  valley  of  the  Danube. 

Turenne  plunged  with  too  great  confidence  into  the 
empire  and  was  defeated  at  Marienthal  by  Mercy  (May, 
1645).  But  the  Duke  of  Enghien  hastened  thither  with 
re-enforcements,  forced  back  the  enemy,  penetrated  into 
Bavaria,  and  accomplished  the  rout  of  the  imperial  army 
in  the  bloody  conflict  of  Nordlingen,  where  Mercy  was 
killed  (August,  1645).  In  1646  he  passed  into  Flanders; 
he  laid  siege  to  Dunkirk  in  sight  of  the  Spaniards,  and  for 
the  first  time  gave  that  place  to  France.  The  following 
year  he  was  in  Catalonia,  where  he  had  reverses  to  retrieve; 
he  besieged  Lerida,  which  two  marshals  had  attacked  in 
vain;  he  was  repulsed  (1647).  This  was  his  first  defeat; 


CHAP.  XVIII.]       THE  THIRTY  YEARS'   WAR.  283 

he  atoned  for  it  upon  another  stage.  The  Spaniards  in 
the  north  had  regained  courage  during  his  absence,  and 
the  Archduke  Leopold, brother  of  the  emperor,  had  advanced 
as  far  as  Lens  in  Artois.  Conde  attacked  them.  The 
battle  was  won  in  two  hours  (August  10,  1648). 

During  these  victories  Turenne  was  carrying  on  opera- 
tions in  Germany,  and  by  his  tactics,  at  once  wise  and 
bold,  was  laying  the  foundation  of  a  reputation  that  time 
has  only  increased.  Joined  by  the  Swedish  Wrangel,  the 
successor  of  Torstenson,  he  won  the  battle  of  Lawingen 
(November,  1647)  ar)d  of  Susmarshausen,  not  far  from 
Augsburg  (May,  1648),  forced  the  passage  of  the  Lech  at 
Rain,  and  compelled  the  Elector  of  Bavaria  at  the  age  of 
seventy-six  years  to  quit  his  states.  Were  it  not  for  a 
pouring  rain  which  suddenly  swelled  the  waters  of  the  Inn 
he  would  have  marched  upon  Vienna.  In  the  council  of 
the  emperor  for  a  moment  the  question  was  raised  if 
Ferdinand  III.  should  not  flee  from  his  capital. 

For  a  long  time  negotiations  had  been  carried  on.  Pro- 
posed as  early  as  1641,  conferences  were  opened  April  10, 
1648,  in  two  towns  of  Westphalia;  at  Munster  between 
the  plenipotentiaries  of  the  Protestant  princes  and  those  of 
the  emperor.  The  map  of  Europe  was  to  be  recast  after  a 
war  that  had  lasted  thirty  years,  a  new  constitution  was  to 
be  given  to  the  empire,  and  the  civil  and  religious  rights  of 
the  Christian  nations  were  to  be  regulated.  France  was 
represented  at  the  congress  by  able  negotiators,  the  Count 
of  Avaux  and  Abel  Servien;  but  her  best  diplomats  were 
Conde  and  Turenne,  whose  swords  had  simplified  negotia- 
tions by  making  peace  necessary.  The  surprise  of  the  castle 
of  Prague  by  the  Swedes  decided  the  emperor  for  peace. 
At  the  last  moment  Spain  withdrew,  hoping  to  profit  by  the 
troubles  of  the  Fronde,  which  were  then  beginning  in 
France.  The  other  states,  eager  to  end  the  struggle, 
signed  the  treaty  (October  24,  1648). 

In  the  Thirty  Years'  War  Austria  had  endeavored  to 
stifle  the  religious  and  political  rights  of  Germany;  since 
she  was  conquered,  what  she  had  wished  to  crush  existed 
and  grew  strong.  The  Protestants  enjoyed  great  freedom 
of  conscience.  The  religious  peace,  signed  at  Augsburg  in 
J555>  was  confirmed.  The  three  religions,  Catholic, 
Lutheran,  Calvinist,  obtained  equal  rights;  as  to  the  pos- 
session of  ecclesiastical  property  and  exercise  of  worship, 


284  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

everything  was  restored  to  the  condition  of  Germany  in 
1624,  except  in  the  Palatinate,  for  which  1618  was  declared 
the  normal  year.  Many  bishoprics  and  abbeys  were  secu- 
larized to  furnish  indemnities  to  the  Protestant  princes. 
Thus  the  Elector  of  Brandenburg  had  the  bishoprics  of 
Magdeburg,  Halberstadt,  Camin,  and  Minden;  the  Duke 
of  Mecklenburg,  those  of  Schwerin  and  Ratzburg;  the 
Landgrave  of  Hesse-Cassel,  the  abbey  of  Hirschfeld  with 
600,000  crowns;  the  Elector  of  Saxony,  Lusatia  with  several 
ecclesiastical  estates.  An  eighth  electorate  was  created  in 
favor  of  the  Palatine  house;  but  Bavaria  kept  the  Upper 
Palatinate.  The  imperial  authority,  but  just  now  threaten- 
ing, was  annulled;  in  the  diet  the  right  of  suffrage  was 
assured  to  all  the  princes  and  the  German  states  upon  all 
questions  of  alliance,  war,  peace,  and  new  laws;  they  were 
confirmed  in  the  full  and  entire  exercise  of  sovereignty  in 
their  own  territory;  and  they  had  the  privilege  of  allying 
themselves  with  foreign  powers,  provided  that  it  was  not, 
as  a  useless  restriction  read,  "against  the  emperor  or 
against  the  empire."  For  a  long  time  Switzerland  and 
Holland  had  been  distinct  from  Germany;  this  separation 
in  fact  received  the  sanction  of  law. 

The  two  powers  that  had  caused  Austria's  defeat  had 
stipulated  important  indemnities  for  themselves.  Sweden 
had  the  islands  of  Rugen,  Wollin,  and  Usedom,  Wismar, 
Western  Pomerania  with  Stettin,  the  archbishopric  of 
Bremen,  and  the  bishopric  of  Verden,  that  is  to  say,  the 
mouths  of  the  three  great  German  rivers  the  Oder,  Elbe, 
and  Weser,  with  5,000,000  crowns  and  three  votes  in  the 
diet. 

France  continued  to  hold  Lorraine,  all  the  while  promis- 
ing to  restore  it  to  its  duke  when  he  had  accepted  the 
French  conditions.  She  caused  the  empire  to  waive  all 
claim  to  the  three  bishoprics,  Metz,  Toul,  and  Verdun, 
which  she  had  held  for  a  century;  to  the  town  of  Pignerol, 
ceded  by  the  Duke  of  Savoy  in  1631;  to  Alsace,  which  was 
given  over  to  her,  with  the  exception  of  Strasburg,  whereby 
her  frontier  in  front  of  the  Vosges  reached  the  Rhine. 
She  still  held  upon  the  east  bank  of  that  river  Vieux- 
Brisach,  and  her  right  was  recognized  to  put  a  garrison  in 
Philippsburg.  Free  navigation  of  the  Rhine  was  guaran- 
teed. 

These  were  great  advantages,  for  by  conquering  Alsace 


o  io 


EUROPE 

IN  1648. 
(Treaty  of  Westphalia) 


HI     Longitude 


CHAP.  XVIII.]       THE  THIRTY  YEARS*   WAR.  285 

France  placed  herself  on  one  side  between  Lorraine  and 
Germany,  on  the  other  at  the  north  of  Franche-Cornte, 
which  since  Henry  IV.  she  enveloped  on  the  south;  so  that 
these  two  provinces  found  themselves  thenceforward  at 
French  discretion,  and  their  union  with  France  was  here- 
after nothing  but  a  question  of  time. 

Thus  France  traced  her  frontiers  better  for  her  own 
defense;  she  was  even  assuming  an  offensive  position. 
Through  Pignerol  she  had  a  hold  beyond  the  Alps  in 
Italy;  through  Vieux-Brisach  and  Philippsburg  she 
obtained  a  footing  beyond  the  Rhine  in  Germany.  Be- 
sides, by  causing  recognition  of  the  right  of  the  German 
states  to  form  alliance  with  foreign  powers  she  held  the 
means  of  always  buying  some  one  of  those  indigent  princes; 
and  by  guaranteeing  the  execution  of  the  treaty  she  gave 
herself  the  right  to  interfere  on  every  occasion  in  the  affairs 
of  Germany.  The  empire,  being  hereafter  only  a  sort  of 
confederation  of  four  or  five  hundred  states,  Lutheran  and 
Catholic,  monarchical  and  republican,  laical  and  ecclesias- 
tical, would  of  necessity  become  the  theater  of  every  in- 
trigue, the  battlefield  of  Europe,  as  Italy  had  been  at  the 
beginning  of  modern  times  and  for  the  same  reasons — its 
divisions  and  anarchy. 

The  treaties  of  Westphalia,  which  are  the  basis  of  all 
diplomatic  agreements  from  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth 
century  down  to  the  French  Revolution,  terminated  the 
supremacy  of  the  house  of  Austria  in  Europe,  and  paved  the 
way  for  the  ascendancy  of  the  house  of  Bourbon. 


CHAPTER   XIX. 
ENGLAND  UNDER  THE  STUARTS  AND  CROMWELL. 


The  Stuarts:  James  I.  (1603-25);  Charles  I.  (1625-40). — The  Long  Par- 
liament (1640-49). — The  Commonwealth  of  England  (1649-60). 


IF  the  house  of  Bourbon  reached  such  a  degree  of  great- 
ness under  Louis  XIV.  it  was  not  only  because  the  Thirty 
The  Stuarts  •  Years'  War  had  humbled  the  house  of  Austria 
King  James  in  its  two  branches,  the  German  and  the 
(1603-25).  Spanish,  before  France;  it  was  also  because 

the  incompetency  of  the  Stuarts  during  the  same  time 
caused  England  to  descend  from  the  lofty  position  to  which 
Elizabeth  had  raised  her. 

After  the  death  of  Elizabeth,  the  King  of  Scotland, 
James  VI.,  son  of  Mary  Stuart  and  great-grandson  through 
the  female  line  of  the  English  king  Henry  VII.,  was  recog- 
nized without  opposition  in  England  and  Ireland  under 
the  name  of  James  I.  The  first  of  the  Stuarts  had  an  awk- 
ward and  embarrassed  air  and  a  grotesque  figure.  He  pos- 
sessed many  vices,  but  not  a  single  real  and  unmixed  virtue. 
His  liberality  was  only  profusion,  his  learning  pedantry,  his 
love  for  peace  faint-heartedness,  his  policy  cunning,  his 
friendship  a  frivolous  caprice.  Henry  IV.  called  him 
"Master  James,"  and  Sully  said  of  him  that  he  was  the 
wisest  fool  whom  he  had  ever  known. 

Abroad  James  I.  abandoned  the  Protestant  policy  that 
had  made  the  greatness  of  England  under  Elizabeth.  He 
refused  to  co-operate  in  the  great  schemes  of  Henry  IV.; 
he  sought  for  the  friendship,  even  the  alliance,  of  Spain, 
and  remained  almost  indifferent  to  the  ruin  of  his  son-in- 
law,  Frederick  V.,  the  Elector  Palatine. 

At  home  he  attempted  to  render  his  power  absolute,  and 
desired  to  make  supreme  the  doctrine  of  the  divine  right  of 


ENGLAND  UNDER  THE  STUARTS.  287 

kings.  This  was  the  motive  of  his  whole  conduct,  the  fun- 
damental principle  of  his  policy.  The  Catholics,  so  cruelly 
persecuted  by  Elizabeth,  counted,  if  not  upon  revenge,  at 
least  upon  an  alleviation  of  their  lot  under  the  son  of  Mary 
Stuart.  James  I.  maintained  the  penal  laws.  As  early  as 
1603  they  tried  to  avenge  themselves  by  two  plots,  the 
Main  and  the  Bye,  which  cost  many  persons  of  distinction 
their  liberty,  among  others  Walter  Raleigh,  one  of  the 
former  favorites  and  ministers  of  Elizabeth,  and  two  priests 
their  lives.  In  1605  some  of  the  most  fiery  spirits  among 
them  formed  the  abominable  Gunpowder  Plot. 

A  few  hours  before  the  opening  of  Parliament  a  Catholic 
peer  received  an  anonymous  letter,  in  which  was  written: 
"I  advise  you,  if  you  value  your  life,  to  find  some  excuse 
for  delaying  your  presence  at  Parliament;  for  God  and 
men  are  preparing  to  punish  the  perversity  of  the  century. 
The  danger  will  be  passed  as  soon  as  you  have  burned  this 
letter."  The  note  was  carried  to  the  ministers,  who 
despised  this  anonymous  advice.  The  king  was  wiser  that 
time  than  his  counselors,  and  divined  that  a  sudden  explo- 
sion was  meant.  A  visit  was  made  to  the  cellars  beneath 
the  House  of  Lords,  and  thirty-six  barrels  of  powder  were 
found  there,  designed  to  blow  up  at  the  same  time  the 
king,  his  family,  and  the  lords  and  commons,  assembled  for 
the  royal  session.  One  of  the  conspirators  stood  near;  he 
was  seized,  put  on  the  rack,  and  named  his  accomplices. 
They  were  all  Catholics.  They  were  tortured  to  death. 
Among  their  number  was  a  provincial  Jesuit,  Father  Garnet, 
whose  guilt  some  affirmed  and  others  denied. 

To-day  England  still  celebrates  on  November  5  the 
anniversary  of  the  Gunpowder  Plot.  The  detection  of 
that  infernal  conspiracy  brought  on  a  real  persecution  of 
the  Catholics.  They  could  not  appear  at  court  or  in  Lon- 
don; their  residence  must  be  at  least  fifteen  kilometers  from 
the  capital,  and  they  were  forbidden  to  go  more  than  seven 
kilometers  away  without  a  special  permit  signed  by  four  mag- 
istrates. They  were  interdicted  from  the  liberal  professions 
or  public  offices,  as  Louis  XIV.  had  interdicted  the  Protes- 
tants in  France.  A  Catholic  could  not  be  either  a  phy- 
sician, a  surgeon,  a  lawyer,  a  judge,  or  a  municipal  officer. 
In  case  of  a  mixed  marriage  that  one,  whether  husband  or 
wife,  who  was  of  the  ancient  faith  had  no  claim  upon  the 
property  of  the  other.  Permission  to  keep  a  Catholic 


288  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

domestic  cost  ten  pounds  sterling  a  month;  in  case  of 
entertaining  a  Catholic  guest  the  host  must  pay  the  same 
amount.  Their  houses  could  be  searched  at  any  time,  con- 
trary to  English  law,  which  protects  the  individual  liberty 
of  the  citizens  and  the  sanctuary  of  the  domestic  hearth. 
Finally,  in  1605  they  were  forced  to  take  the  oath  of  alle- 
giance, whereby  they  pledged  themselves  to  defend  the  king 
against  every  plot,  and  acknowledged  as  impious  and  dam- 
nable the  doctrine  that  a  prince  excommunicated  by  the 
Pope  could  be  deposed  by  his  subjects.  It  is  only  in  our 
own  day  that  the  Catholics  in  England  have  been  formally 
delivered  from  a  legislation  which  placed  them  outside  the 
benefits  of  common  law. 

The  Nonconformists  had  reason  to  expect  better  treat- 
ment from  a  prince  who  had  been  nurtured  in  their  doc- 
trines in  Scotland;  James  persecuted  them  pitilessly.  Puri- 
tanism was  even  more  odious  to  him  than  the  Roman 
religion;  for  the  Puritans  set  aside  ecclesiastical  hierarchy, 
and  James  I.  said  with  reason:  "No  bishops,  no  king. " 
The  first  of  the  Stuarts,  therefore,  continued  all  his  life 
rigidly  attached  to  the  Church  of  England,  persecuting  the 
Catholics  who  denied  his  religious  supremacy,  persecuting  the 
Nonconformists,  whose  republican  tendencies  he  dreaded. 
He  failed  in  his  attempt  to  establish  Anglicanism  in  Scot- 
land (1617).  The  Puritans  in  order  to  escape  from  his 
executioners  in  1620  sought  in  America,  near  Cape  Cod 
in  Massachusetts,  a  land  where  they  could  pray  to  God  in 
their  own  way.  Others  were  to  follow  them  there.  The 
United  States  of  America  was  the  ultimate  result.  Thus 
persecution  succeeds! 

The  spirit  of  liberty,  however,  was  springing  up  again 
under  a  weak  and  prodigal  prince,  who  wasted  like  a  par- 
venu the  rich  heritage  that  his  birth  had  given  him. 
Thanks  to  her  economy,  Elizabeth  had  needed  to  convene 
Parliament  but  rarely.  James  I.  on  account  of  his  own 
extravagance  found  himself  involved  in  debt  from  the  time 
of  his  accession.  He  assembled  Parliament  three  times; 
three  times  he  prorogued  it  almost  immediately.  The 
Houses  were  not  willing  to  grant  subsidies  unless  the  king 
gave  up  his  prerogative;  the  king  promised  no  guarantee 
of  liberty  unless  the  Houses  first  voted  subsidies.  Both 
sides  were  equally  persistent;  it  was  useless  for  James  in 
1614  to  send  five  members  to  the  Tower;  he  could  not 


CHAP.  XIX.]     ENGLAND  UNDER  THE  STUARTS.  289 

overcome  the  resistance  made  by  the  Commons.  He  was 
no  more  fortunate  in  1617,  and  was  obliged  to  dissolve 
Parliament. 

Nothing  could  have  served  better  to  arouse  and  at  the 
same  time  to  confirm  the  opposition  of  Parliament  than  the 
peculiar  mingling  of  haughtiness  and  weakness  which  char- 
acterized James  I.  He  wrote  that  the  All-powerful  had 
placed  kings  above  the  law;  yet  he  allowed  himself  to  be 
governed  by  prevaricating  ministers  or  abandoned  his 
power  to  unworthy  favorites.  At  first  he  had  permitted 
Robert  Cecil,  son  of  Lord  Burleigh,  whom  he  had  found 
minister  at  the  death  of  Elizabeth,  to  continue  in  that 
capacity,  and  had  made  him  Earl  of  Salisbury.  Covetous 
and  unscrupulous,  Cecil  was  none  the  less  able.  In  1612  he 
was  replaced  by  a  young  Scotchman,  Robert  Carr,  whom 
James  appointed  successively  Viscount  of  Rochester  and 
Earl  of  Somerest,  and  who,  convicted  of  having  poisoned 
one  of  this  former  friends,  was  succeeded  by  another 
favorite  twenty-two  years  of  age;  this  was  George  Villiers, 
who  possessed  every  physical  and  mental  grace  save 
common  sense.  In  two  years  he  was  made  knight,  gentle- 
man of  the  king's  chamber,  baron,  viscount,  Marquis  of 
Buckingham,  high  admiral,  guardian  of  the  Cinque  Ports, 
finally,  absolute  dispenser  of  all  the  honors,  offices,  and 
revenues  of  the  three  realms  (1615). 

Buckingham  employed  his  power  with  scandalous  avidity, 
and  in  a  short  time  amassed  immense  wealth,  which  he 
squandered  in  foolish  luxury.  The  king  let  him  alone,  for 
he  did  the  same.  Unable  to  obtain  subsidies  from  Parlia- 
ment, he  had  recourse  to  the  most  disgraceful  traffic. 
The  court  offices  and  the  judgeships  were  put  up  at  auc- 
tion; new  titles  were  created  which  were  sold  for  cash; 
unjust  lawsuits  were  instituted  to  confiscate  the  property  of 
the  accused;  this  example  became  so  contagious  that  the 
famous  Bacon,  then  chancellor,  allowed  himself  peculations 
which  caused  his  condemnation  by  the  court  of  Peers 
to  imprisonment  and  to  the  enormous  fine  of  ,£40,000 
sterling  (1621).  The  king,  on  his  side,  in  1616  sold 
to  the  States  General  for  2,728,000  florins  the  towns 
of  Briel,  Flushing,  and  Rammekens,  given  to  Elizabeth 
as  security  for  certain  sums  of  money  advanced  or  ex- 
pended by  her  on  account  of  the  United  Provinces.  The 
larger  part  of  this  money  quickly  passed  into  the  favorite's 


290  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

house,  and  the  nation  became  indignant  because  traffic  had 
been  made  of  its  influence. 

In  spite  of  these  expedients  the  treasury  remained  empty. 
James  profited  by  the  dangers  that  Protestantism  encoun- 
tered in  Germany  to  summon  a  new  Parliament.  But  the 
Commons  granted  subsidies  only  on  condition  that  the  griev- 
ances of  the  nation  should  be  redressed.  The  king  again 
dissolved  the  assembly  (1622).  Attracted  by  the  bait  of  a 
rich  dowry,  he  resolved  to  give  his  son  in  marriage  to  an 
infanta  of  Spain.  But  this  scheme  failed,  thanks  to  the 
scandalous  folly  of  Buckingham,  and,  on  the  contrary, 
brought  on  a  war  with  Spain  (1623).  In  order  to  obtain 
money,  it  was  necessary  to  grant  to  the  parliamentary  com- 
missioners the  right  of  collecting  taxes  and  of  superintend- 
ing their  use,  to  abolish  monopolies  and  solemnly  recognize 
individual  liberty.  James  died  a  short  time  afterward 
(April  i,  1625).  He  had  just  decided  upon  the  marriage 
of  his  son  with  Henrietta  of  France,  the  sister  of  Louis 
XIII. 

James  I.,  or  Master  James,  as  Henry  IV.  called  him,  de- 
bated a  great  deal  and  wrote  no  less.  His  principal  works 
were  the  "Basilicon  Doron"  and  the  "True  Law  of  Free 
Monarchy. ' '  The  Tudors  had  established  absolute  power  in 
reality;  the  first  of  the  Stuarts  wished  to  establish  it  in  law, 
and  the  second  of  the  works  that  we  have  just  mentioned  is 
the  dogmatic  exposition  of  this  theory.  In  it  James  de- 
clares that  the  king  rules  and  that  the  -subject  obeys;  that 
kings  rule  in  virtue  of  divine  right,  and  that  the  All- 
powerful,  whose  image  they  are,  has  set  them  above  the 
law;  that  consequently  a  prince  can  make  statutes  and 
punish  without  the  intervention  of  a  parliament,  and  that  he 
is  not  bound  to  the  strict  observance  of  the  laws  of  the 
state.  What  the  king  wrote  the  Anglican  clergy  elevated  to 
a  doctrine,  and  in  its  canons  of  1606  expressly  recom- 
mended absolute  obedience  to  the  monarch. 

This  double  affirmation  was  a  double  indiscretion.  Des- 
potism can  exist  a  long  time  in  deeds,  it  cannot  suffer  itself 
to  be  long  discussed.  James  I.  wanted  to  be  a  despot,  but 
he  did  not  know  how.  He  lacked  three  necessary  things: 
money,  of  which  Parliament  was  the  jealous  dispenser;  an 
army,  which  in  that  island  did  not  exist;  public  opinion, 
which  he  had  alienated.  While  he  wrote  about  the  theory 
of  passive  obedience  the  nation,  by  the  discussion,  accus- 


CHAP.  XIX. J    ENGLAND  UNDER  THE  STUARTS.  291 

tomed  itself  to  liberty,  and  was  shortly  to  gain  it  through 
revolution. 

England  expected  much  from  her  new  king.  He  was  a 
prince  of  sedate  and  pure  morals,  earnest,  well  educated, 
who  in  his  household  maintained  order  and 
)S  I'  propriety.  His  manners  and  his  air  overawed 
the  courtiers  and  pleased  the  people.  His 
virtues  would  have  gained  him  the  esteem  of  all  good  peo- 
ple if  sincerity  had  been  combined  with  them.  His  ac- 
cession excited  unanimous  feelings  of  joy  and  hope.  But 
this  joy  diminished  when  the  king  was  seen  to  confide 
wholly  in  Buckingham  and  the  new  queen  to  be  sur- 
rounded only  by  Catholics.  The  defiant  spirit  of  the 
Reformers  suspected  a  serious  danger  in  the  noisy  but  power- 
less intrigues  of  an  imprudent  woman. 

Compromised  by  the  persons  around  him,  Charles  I.  was 
also  out  of  sympathy  with  the  nation  upon  fundamental 
questions  of  political  right.  His  father  had  imbued  him 
with  the  doctrines  of  absolutism.  In  the  rest  of  Europe  he 
saw  communal  liberties  abolished,  aristocratic  prerogatives 
crushed,  and  the  power  of  the  kings  raised  above  all  con- 
tradiction and  obstacle.  Charles  I.  loved  his  subjects;  but 
to  assure  their  happiness  he  intended,  like  the  Tudors,  to 
guard  their  liberty  under  lock  and  key.  He  forgot  what 
had  caused,  not  the  ruin,  but  the  eclipse  of  public  rights: 
the  fatigue  of  thirty  years  of  war  during  the  War  of  the 
Roses;  then  the  question  of  the  Reformation,  which  for 
thirty  years  more  had  occupied  all  minds;  finally,  the  war 
with  Philip  II.,  when  even  the  life  of  England  was  at  stake. 
In  the  face  of  such  perils  the  country  could  very  well  allow 
her  kings  to  assume  absolute  power;  but  now  that  Spain 
was  dying,  that  France  was  no  longer  threatening,  and  that 
the  religious  question  was  settled  once  for  all,  England 
wished  to  enter  again  upon  her  former  ways  and  resume 
her  former  representative  government,  suspended  fora  time. 

In  fact  the  love  of  public  liberty  was  arising  in  the  hearts 
of  the  citizens,  who,  enriched  under  Elizabeth  and  James  I. 
by  commerce  and  industry,  had  profited  by  the  prodigalities 
of  the  king  and  his  courtiers  to  become  creditors  of  the 
nobility  and  of  the  crown.  They  felt  their  importance  in 
the  state.  They  formed  the  majority  in  the  House  of 
Commons;  they  exercised  all  the  liberal  professions;  they 
were  the  masters  of  capital,  No  wonder  is  it  that  now 


292  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

they  wished  to  have  a  share  in  the  power  and  to  control  the 
actions  of  an  illmanaged  government. 

Another  force  was  driving  England  into  the  same  path. 
The  king  and  the  nobles  had  brought  about,  in  the  sixteenth 
century,  their  reform  in  religion,  wholly  aristocratic;  the 
people  had  not  accomplished  theirs,  and  this  reformation, 
popular,  democratic,  radical,  began  to  dawn :  it  was  that  of 
the  Puritans.  Henry  VIII.  and  Elizabeth  had  established 
an  official  Church,  very  richly  endowed,  and  more  docile 
toward  the  government  than  the  Catholic  Church  had  ever 
been.  But  this  clergy,  living  in  splendor,  preaching  abso- 
lute obedience  toward  the  princes,  declaring  itself  a  divine 
institution,  did  not  at  all  satisfy  those  in  whose  hands  the 
Bible  had  been  put,  and  who  wished  to  read  there  only  the 
devotion  and  poverty  of  the  first  Levites,  the  imprecations 
of  the  prophets  against  tyrants,  the  denunciation  against  the 
idolatrous  practices  of  the  established  Church,  against  its 
hierarchy,  its  worship,  its  liturgy,  and  its  consecrated  forms. 
Those  who  demanded  political  liberty  and  those  who  de- 
manded religious  freedom  were  shortly  to  come  together, 
and,  united,  to  bring  on  a  revolution  whose  results  they 
were  afterward  to  dispute. 

The  reign  of  Charles  I.  divides  itself  into  three  periods: 

In  the  first  (1625-29)  he  attempts  to  rule  with  Parlia- 
ment. 

In  the  second  (1629-40)  he  rules  without  Parliament. 

In  the  third  (1640-48)  he  is  forced  to  endure  it;  he  re- 
sists it  and  is  defeated. 

We  have  just  seen  that  at  the  accession  of  Charles  I.  the 
government  and  the  country  did  not  agree,  the  king  cling- 
ing to  the  absolutist  theories  of  his  father,  and  the  nation 
wishing  to  return  to  its  former  liberties.  The  inevitable 
struggle  broke  out  in  the  first  days  of  his  reign. 

It  was  the  practice  to  vote  the  customs  duties  for  the 
whole  duration  of  the  reign ;  the  Lower  House  voted  them 
only  for  one  year.  By  this  act  it  declared  its  distrust, 
doubtless  not  of  the  king,  but  of  his  government.  Charles, 
irritated,  pronounced  the  dissolution  of  the  assembly. 

The  Parliament  of  1626  went  farther:  to  a  demand  for 
a  subsidy  it  replied  by  a  statement  of  grievances,  and  im- 
peached Buckingham.  The  king  to  save  his  favorite  was 
again  obliged  to  dismiss  Parliament,  counting  upon  forced 
loans  to  take  the  place  of  the  taxes  which  the  nation  refused, 


CHAP.  XIX.]     ENGLAND  UNDER  THE  STUARTS.  293 

enrolling  soldiers  to  intimidate  the  citizens,  and  in  many 
places  proclaiming  martial  law  in  order  to  suspend  the  ordi- 
nary course  of  justice. 

In  the  hope  of  acquiring  a  little  popularity  Buckingham 
persuaded  Charles  I.,  already  engaged  in  a  struggle  with 
Spain,  to  enter  upon  war  with  France,  and  commanded  a 
fleet  for  the  relief  of  the  Protestants  of  La  Rochelle.  But 
the  expedition  failed  in  the  attack  upon  the  island  of  Re 
through  the  incapacity  of  the  general  (1627),  just  as  an 
attempt  upon  Cadiz  in  1625  had  failed.  To  avert  an 
explosion  of  public  discontent  Charles  summoned  a  third 
Parliament.  But  Buckingham's  defeat  had  emboldened  the 
Commons.  They  came  with  the  resolution  of  overthrow- 
ing the  favorite  and  of  reforming  the  abuses.  They  ad- 
dressed two  remonstrances  to  the  king — the  one  against  the 
illegal  collection  of  the  customs  duties,  the  other  against 
Buckingham,  whom  they  termed  the  author  of  the  public 
misery.  Charles  lost  patience  and  prorogued  Parliament. 
Protestant  fanaticism  then  found  its  Ravaillac.  John  Felton 
assassinated  Buckingham  (1628),  and  the  following  year 
Parliament  drew  up  the  Petition  of  Rights  of  the  nation. 
It  was  like  a  second  Magna  Charta  of  England.  The  king 
accepted  it;  then  he  pledged  himself  never  to  levy  a  tax 
without  the  consent  of  the  Houses,  never  to  imprison  any- 
one except  according  to  the  forms  of  law,  never  to  estab- 
lish courts  martial.  But  a  few  weeks  had  scarcely  passed 
when  he  forgot  his  word,  prorogued  Parliament,  and  cast 
into  prison  its  most  earnest  members.  One  of  them,  Sir 
John  Eliot,  died  there  after  several  years  of  suffering. 
Charles  then  took  as  ministers  two  resolute  men,  Arch- 
bishop Laud  and  Sir  Thomas  Wentworth,  later  Earl  of 
Strafford,  one  of  the  opposition  leaders  in  Parliament,  and 
the  author  of  the  Petition  of  Rights,  but  who,  devoured  by 
ambition,  did  not  shrink  from  an  apostasy,  and  who  pro- 
posed to  play  in  England  the  part  that  Richelieu  was  at  that 
moment  playing  in  France. 

Charles  remained  eleven  years  without  summoning  Parlia- 
ment, a  longer  interval  than  had  ever  elapsed  before  (March, 
1629,  to  April,  1640).  By  dispensing  with  the  Houses  he 
condemned  himself  to  economy  and  inaction.  The  king 
hastened  to  make  peace  with  both  France  and  Spain,  and 
held  himself  aloof  from  the  great  struggle  waged  upon  the 
Continent  between  the  two  principal  religions  which  were  dis- 


294  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

puting  the  empire  of  the  world.  England,  which  Elizabeth 
had  placed  at  the  head  of  Protestantism,  under  Charles  I. 
remained  apart  from  the  Thirty  Years'  War! 

Despised  abroad,  the  king  was  not  much  stronger  at 
home.  He  had  believed  he  would  repose  in  the  bosom  of 
absolute  power;  but  in  his  own  palace  two  parties  were 
already  disputing  for  control  in  the  nascent  despotism:  the 
queen,  the  center  of  many  an  intrigue;  the  ministers,  who 
wanted  neither  the  papacy  nor  the  prodigality  of  Henri- 
etta. The  unfortunate  prince  had  ample  occupation  would 
he  conciliate  these  domestic  rivalries. 

This  government  so  weak  was  none  the  less  tyrannical. 
Taxes  not  voted  by  the  Houses,  as  ship-money  (1634),  and 
consequently  illegal,  were  established;  the  enemies  of  the 
court  were  imprisoned  without  trial  and  condemned  by  the 
Star  Chamber  or  by  the  Council  of  York,  over  which  Straf- 
ford  presided.  Laud  and  his  High  Commission,  a  real  tri- 
bunal of  the  Holy  Office,  persecuted  the  Dissenters  with 
incredible  barbarity.  Thus  Dr.  Leighton  for  a  pamph- 
let was  sentenced  to  the  pillory,  to  the  whipping  post,  to 
have  his  ears  cut  off,  after  which  the  hangman  split  his 
nose  and  branded  his  face  with  a  red-hot  iron.  The  same 
punishments  were  inflicted  upon  the  barrister  Prynne,  upon 
Bastwick,  upon  the  minister  Burton;  the  same  heroism  also 
was  shown  by  these  new  martyrs.  Each  day  persecution 
doubled  the  number  of  their  adherents.  "Christians,"  said 
Prynne  as  he  stood  in  the  pillory,  "if  we  had  valued  our 
liberty  we  should  not  be  here;  it  is  for  the  liberty  of  you 
all  that  we  have  forfeited  ours;  guard  it  well  I  beseech  you; 
hold  firm;  be  faithful  to  the  cause  of  God  and  of  the  land; 
otherwise  you  and  your  children  will  fall  into  everlasting 
servitude."  The  Puritan  sects  increased  in  spite  of  the 
inquisitoral  earnestness  of  the  primate  Laud,  and  intrepid 
soldiers  were  preparing  for  the  impending  struggle. 

Also  about  this  time  the  emigration  to  America  so  in- 
creased that  it  is  estimated  that  goods  valued  at  more 
than  12,000,000  francs  left  the  country.  For  many  reasons 
the  government  became  so  odious  that  thousands  of  men 
quitted  their  native  land.  In  1627  Puritans  departed  to 
rejoin  the  emigrants  of  1620  around  Massachusetts  Bay; 
three  years  later  the  colonies  of  New  Hampshire  and  Maine 
were  founded.  The  government  grew  alarmed  at  this 
expatriation  of  a  disaffected  population.  An  order  of  the 


CHAP.  XIX.]     ENGLAND  UNDER  THE  STUARTS.  295 

council  forbade  the  Dissenters  to  emigrate.  At  that  mo- 
ment eight  vessels  ready  to  start  were  at  anchor  in  the 
Thames;  upon  one  of  them  it  is  said  Cromwell  had  already 
embarked.  He  obeyed  the  prohibition,  but  the  others  con- 
tinued on  their  way  in  search  of  a  more  hospitable  soil. 
From  1635  to  1637  were  formed  the  colonies  of  Connecticut, 
Rhode  Island,  and  the  Providence  plantations. 

Hampden's  trial,  however,  should  have  enlightened  the 
king  and  his  ministers  (1636).  The  immense  popularity 
which  he  immediately  enjoyed  because  he  had  known 
how  to  oppose  a  calm  refusal  and  legal  resistance  to  the  tax 
of  ship-money  made  it  sufficiently  plain  to  the  govern- 
ment that  its  policy  was  contrary  to  the  sentiment  of  the 
nation.  The  ministers  were  obstinate  in  their  blindness. 
Strafford,  Viceroy  of  Ireland,  had  organized  there  a  standing 
army,  thanks  to  which  he  could  boast  of  having  rendered 
the  king  as  absolute  in  the  island  as  was  any  prince  in  the 
world.  Laud  on  his  part  was  ferreting  out  the  Noncon- 
formists and  was  punishing  them  with  such  rigor  that  all 
England  put  on  the  mask  of  religious  submission.  On  the 
very  eve  of  the  revolution  the  bishops  reported  to  him  that 
they  could  not  find  a  single  Dissenter  in  their  dioceses,  just 
as  the  ministers  of  Louis  XIV.  announced  to  him  after  the 
repeal  of  the  edict  of  Nantes  that  there  were  no  more 
Protestants  in  the  kingdom.  Laud  wished  to  extend  his 
victory  over  Presbyterian  Scotland  and  to  impose  upon  her 
a  new  liturgy  which  resembled  the  Catholic  ritual.  A  re- 
bellion broke  out  in  Edinburgh  (1637).  The  king  refused 
to  yield.  Then  the  Presbyterians,  under  the  name  of  the 
Covenant,  formed  an  association  at  once  political  and  reli- 
gious, which  soon  counted  the  entire  Scottish  population 
as  its  adherents  (1638).  Charles  marched  against  the 
Covenanters  with  20,000  men;  but  he  did  not  dare  to  offer 
battle  and  granted  the  abolition  of  Laud's  liturgy  to  the 
rebels  (1639). 

It  was  a  serious  defeat;  Charles,  at  the  end  of  his  re- 
sources, summoned  a  fourth  Parliament.  That  assembly 
refused  to  grant  the  least  subsidy  until  redress  had  been 
made  of  the  nation's  grievances;  it  demanded  that  the 
king  should  be  bound  to  convoke  Parliament  every  three 
years,  that  independence  in  elections  and  debate  should  be 
assured,  that  political  liberty  should  be  firmly  guaranteed. 
"It  is  necessary,"  Strafford  remarked,  whom  Charles  had 


296  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

recalled  from  Ireland,  "to  restore  these  people  to  common 
sense  by  blows,"  and  the  Short  Parliament  was  dissolved. 
But  the  English  army,  full  of  sympathy  for  its  Scottish 
brethren,  dispersed  rather  than  fight,  and  Strafford  was 
forced  to  fall  back  upon  York  (1640).  Royalty  was  in- 
volved in  inextricable  difficulty.  It  had  drawn  the  sword 
and  it  had  not  a  crown  to  maintain  the  war.  The  system 
of  confiscations,  fines,  and  arbitrary  taxes  was  exhausted. 
Charles,  confessing  himself  worsted,  had  recourse  to  a  fifth 
Parliament.  This  was  that  renowned  assembly  "which,  in 
spite  of  many  errors  and  disasters,  is  justly  entitled  to  the 
reverence  and  gratitude  of  all  who,  in  any  part  of  the  world, 
enjoy  the  blessings  of  constitutional  government"  (Lord 
Macaulay). 

After  eleven   years  of  despotism  Charles  I.,  by  making 

an  appeal  to  the  country,  furnished  a  striking  contradiction 

to  the  system  which  he  had  followed  up  to 

The       Long  .     J  .... 

Parliament  that  time.  The  king  recognized  his  own 
(1640-49).  inability  to  rule  England  alone.  It  belonged 

to  the  Commons  to  act  their  legitimate  part ;  but  liberty, 
too  long  oppressed,  wanted  to  take  revenge,  and,  as 
always  happens,  overshot  the  mark.  Parliament  took  pos- 
session of  the  power.  It  encroached  upon  the  collection 
and  management  of  taxes,  and  loans,  and  even  upon  all  the 
functions,  all  the  rights  of  the  executive  power.  It  abol- 
ished exceptional  tribunals,  declared  its  own  periodicity, 
and  -finally  issued  a  bill  of  indictment  against  the  Earl  of 
Strafford,  in  whom  was  personified  the  whole  royal  policy 
for  eleven  years. 

This  trial  excited  immense  interest.  In  reality  it  was 
the  trial  of  royalty,  prior  to  the  trial  of  the  king.  Clever, 
eloquent,  courageous,  the  accused  in  the  face  of  danger 
showed  a  grandeur  of  soul  that  caused  his  faults  to  be  for- 
gotten. "During  seventeen  days  he  discussed  the  crimes 
that  were  imputed  to  him,  alone  against  thirteen  accusers, 
who  relieved  each  other  in  turn.  A  great  number  were 
proved,  full  of  iniquity  and  tyranny;  but  others,  exaggerated 
or  made  much  of  by  hatred,  were  easy  to  refute;  and  none, 
to  say  the  truth,  came  within  the  legal  definition  of  high 
treason.  Strafford  strove  carefully  to  strip  them  of  this 
character,  speaking  nobly  of  his  imperfections,  of  his  weak- 
nesses, opposing  a  modest  dignity  to  the  violence  of  his 
adversaries,  without  invectives  making  evident  the  preju- 


CHAP.  XIX.]     ENGLAND  UNDER  THE  STUARTS.  297 

diced  illegality  of  their  proceedings.  Odious  restrictions 
hampered  his  defense.  His  counsel,  obtained  at  great 
difficulty  and  in  spite  of  the  Commons,  were  not  permitted 
to  speak  upon  the  facts  nor  to  interrogate  the  witnesses; 
permission  to  summon  witnesses  in  rebuttal  was  accorded 
to  him  only  three  days  before  the  opening  of  the  pleas,  and 
the  most  of  them  were  in  Ireland.  At  every  opportunity  he 
claimed  his  rights,  thanked  his  judges  if  they  consented  to 
recognize  them,  did  not  complain  of  their  refusal,  and  to  his 
enemies,  who  were  exasperated  by  the  delays  caused  by  his 
able  resistance,  replied  simply:  'I  believe  it  belongs  to  me 
to  defend  my  life  as  well  as  to  any  other  to  attack  it  ' 
(Guizot). 

The  House  of  Lords  was  going  to  absolve  him;  the 
Commons  by  a  bill  of  attainder  placed  him  outside  the 
law.  Charles  alone  could  save  him  by  refusing  to  sanction 
the  bill.  Strafford  in  a  sublime  letter  offered  to  sacrifice 
himself.  The  king  had  the  weakness  to  accept  the  sacrifice 
and  signed  his  minister's  death  warrant.  Strafford  as  his 
only  answer  raised  his  hands  to  Heaven  and  murmured: 
"Nolite  confidere  principibus  et  filiis  hominum,  quia  non 
est  salus  in  illis."  The  governor  of  the  Tower  urged  him 
to  take  a  carriage  in  order  to  avoid  the  violence  of  the 
people;  he  refused,  and  set  out  on  foot,  preceding  the 
guards,  and  turning  his  gaze  in  all  directions  as  if  he  were 
marching  at  the  head  of  his  troops.  Arrived  at  the 
scaffold,  he  said:  "I  pray  for  this  kingdom  every  earthly 
prosperity;  living,  I  have  always  prayed  it;  dying,  it  is  my 
only  prayer.  But  I  beseech  each  one  who  hears  me  to  con- 
sider earnestly,  with  his  hand  upon  his  heart,  whether  the 
beginning  of  a  kingdom's  reformation  ought  to  be  written 
in  characters  of  blood ;  think  well  upon  this  as  you  go  to 
your  homes."  Then  he  placed  his  head  upon  the  block, 
and  gave  the  signal  himself  (May  27,  1641).  Laud, 
imprisoned  at  the  same  time  as  Strafford,  was  not  con- 
demned and  executed  until  four  years  later. 

The  punishment  of  the  Earl  of  Strafford,  the  great 
apostate,  as  he  was  called,  struck  with  terror  all  the  agents  of 
the  government,  and  gave  over  the  entire  royal  power  into 
the  hands  of  the  two  Houses.  Meanwhile  the  Irish  re- 
volted and  massacred  40,000  English  Protestants.  The 
queen's  Catholic  intrigues  caused  the  king  to  be  suspected, 
and  he  himself,  trying  to  deceive  Argyle  and  Hamilton,  the 


298  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

leaders  of  the  Covenanters  in  Scotland,  warranted  the  belief 
that  a  vast  scheme  had  been  formed  by  the  court  against 
the  popular  leaders.  When  he  demanded  the  means  of 
reducing  Ireland,  Parliament  replied  by  a  bitter  remon- 
strance, wherein  were  narrated  in  detail  all  the  grievances 
of  the  nation  since  the  beginning  of  the  reign.  At  the  same 
same  time  ^£300,000  sterling  were  paid  to  the  Scotch  as 
indemnity  and  compensation,  and  the  Militia  Bill  was 
carried,  by  which  Parliament  was  to  interfere  in  the  organi- 
zation of  the  army  and  the  appointment  of  its  leaders. 

Charles  attempted  a  coup  d 'e'tat  to  regain  the  power;  he 
went  in  person  to  Parliament  to  arrest  the  leaders  of  the 
opposition.  But  the  House  refused  to  give  up  the  mem- 
bers, and  before  the  threatening  attitude  of  the  people  the 
king  did  not  dare  to  use  force.  He  quitted  London  to 
commence  the  civil  war  (1642). 

The  parliamentary  party  was  in  possession  of  the  capital, 
the  large  cities,  the  harbors,  and  the  fleet.  The  king  had 
the  greater  part  of  the  nobility,  better  trained  in  arms  than 
the  parliamentary  troops.  In  the  northern  and  western 
counties  the  royalists,  or  Cavaliers,  predominated;  the  par- 
liamentarians, or  Roundheads,  had  those  of  the  east,  center, 
and  southeast,  the  most  thickly  populated,  the  richest,  and 
which,  besides  being  adjacent,  formed,  as  it  were,  a  belt 
about  London. 

At  first  the  king  had  the  advantage.  From  Nottingham, 
where  he  had  raised  his  standard  (August  23,  1642),  he 
marched  toward  the  western  counties,  more  favorable  to 
his  cause,  to  recruit  volunteers,  met  the  parliamentary  army 
at  Worcester,  but  without  engaging  in  a  pitched  battle,  and 
took  the  road  to  London.  Essex  to  arrest  his  march 
fought  the  bloody  and  indecisive  battle  of  Edgehill 
(October  24,  1642).  With  no  further  hope  of  taking  the 
capital  by  surprise  Charles  withdrew  to  Oxford,  where  he 
took  up  his  winter  quarters,  waiting  for  the  aid  which  the 
queen  was  to  bring  him  from  Holland.  The  campaign  fol- 
lowing opened  well  for  him  ;  everywhere  the  parliamentary 
troops  were  defeated,  and  a  number  of  towns  in  the  north 
and  southwest  were  captured.  But  Parliament  redoubled 
its  energy ;  several  members  of  the  Commons  took  up  arms. 
Hampden  levied  among  his  own  tenants,  friends,  and  neigh- 
bors a  regiment  of  infantry  which  soon  became  noted  for 
its  discipline  and  courage.  Oliver  Cromwell,  who  was 


CHAP.  XIX.]    ENGLAND  UNDER  THE  STUARTS.  299 

then  beginning  to  emerge  from  obscurity,  with  the  sons  of 
yeomen  and  small  proprietors  in  the  eastern  counties 
formed  a  picked  squadron  who  opposed  their  religious  zeal 
to  the  feelings  of  honor  which  animated  the  Cavaliers.  The 
king  laid  siege  to  Gloucester,  the  only  city  which  still  ham- 
pered his  movements  in  the  west.  It  made  a  noble  resist- 
ance, which  gave  Parliament  time  to  reassemble  its  forces. 
At  the  approach  of  Essex  Charles  retired,  but  maneuvered  in 
such  a  way  as  to  cut  off  the  earl  from  the  road  to  London, 
and  stationed  himself  at  Newbury;  the  parliamentary  troops 
routed  the  royalist  army  after  a  desperate  struggle  in  which 
Lord  Falkland,  the  pride  of  the  royalist  party,  perished. 
This  victory  influenced  Parliament  to  join  with  the  Scotch, 
and  a  solemn  covenant  was  sworn  between  the  two  peoples. 
On  his  side  the  king  attempted  to  raise  the  Highlanders, 
and  treated  with  the  Catholics  of  Ireland,  who  had  been  in 
arms  ever  since  the  great  massacre.  He  recalled  the  troops 
charged  with  resisting  them. 

Parliament  was  only  a  coalition  of  opposite  parties. 
United  against  the  king's  claims  to  absolute  power,  they  did 
not  agree  any  farther  upon  the  conditions  of  government. 
Presbyterians,  who  had  abolished  hierarchy  in  the  Church, 
were  willing  to  preserve  it  in  the  state;  the  Independents 
rejected  the  peerage  as  well  as  episcopacy,  the  political 
sovereignty  of  the  king  as  well  as  his  religious  supremacy. 
Bolder  and  more  consistent  than  their  rivals,  they  appealed 
to  the  most  active  sentiments  of  the  human  heart,  love  of 
liberty  and  need  of  equality.  Around  them  were  grouped 
the  thousand  sects  sprung  from  Puritanism:  Levelers, 
Anabaptists,  Millenarians.  Finally,  they  had  at  their  head 
men  of  consummate  ability — Ludlow,  Vane,  Haselrig,  and 
above  all  Oliver  Cromwell.  All  the  qualities  of  the  latter 
had  pleased  from  the  first — his  religious  enthusiasm,  his 
readiness  to  make  himself  the  equal  and  companion  of  his 
coarsest  friends,  his  mystical  and  familiar  language,  his 
manner,  by  turns  commonplace  and  enthusiastic,  which 
gave  him  the  air  sometimes  of  inspiration,  sometimes  of 
frankness,  even  that  free  and  supple  genius  which  seemed 
to  place  at  the  service  of  a  holy  cause  all  the  resources 
of  earthly  skill.  Thus  he  had  soon  acquired  a  powerful 
control. 

If  discord  prevailed  among  the  Parliamentarians,  it  also 
existed  in  the  royalist  party.  At  Oxford,  as  at  Whitehall, 


300  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

the  court  was  divided  by  miserable  intrigues.  A  Parlia- 
ment that  Charles  formed  with  his  faithful  friends  was  use- 
less, and  in  spite  of  its  docile  compliance  angered  the 
king,  who  adjourned  it  to  free  himself  from  what  he  called 
cowardly  and  seditious  motions,  so  vexatious  to  him  was 
even  the  shadow  of  a  free  discussion. 

The  campaign  of  1644  was  remarkable  for  the  large  dis- 
play of  forces  on  both  sides.  The  royal  army  in  the  north, 
commanded  by  Prince  Rupert,  was  completely  defeated  at 
Marston  Moor  near  York  (July  2).  This  grand  success 
was  due  to  Cromwell's  genius  and  to  the  invincible  tenacity 
of  his  squadrons.  They  won  the  name  of  Ironsides  upon 
the  battlefield.  In  the  south  Essex  and  Waller,  the  Presby- 
terian generals,  suffered  defeat  after  defeat;  the  first  was 
forced  to  capitulate.  In  Scotland  the  brave  Marquis  of 
Montrose  had  landed  with  an  Irish  contingent,  roused 
the  Highlanders  to  action,  and  won  victories  in  quick 
succession.  For  the  third  time  the  king  marched  upon 
London  ;  the  people  were  closing  their  shops,  praying,  and 
fasting,  when  they  heard  that  Charles  had  just  been 
defeated  at  Newbury  by  Cromwell  and  Manchester.  The 
parliamentary  troops  had  accomplished  prodigies;  at  the 
sight  of  the  cannon  which  they  had  lost  just  before  in  the 
county  of  Cornwall  they  rushed  upon  the  royal  batteries  and 
recaptured  their  pieces,  embracing  them  as  they  dragged 
them  back. 

Cromwell's  successes  rendered  the  Independent  party 
more  daring.  A  minority  in  Parliament,  they  took  control 
of  the  war  by  passing  the  celebrated  Self-denying  Ordi- 
nance, which  excluded  the  members,  that  is  to  say,  the  first 
parliamentary  generation,  from  public  offices,  an  error 
which  was  revived  by  the  first  French  Constitutional  Assem- 
bly (1792).  The  Earl  of  Essex,  a  Presbyterian  general, 
tendered  his  resignation;  he  was  succeeded  by  Fairfax,  an 
Independent,  over  whom  Cromwell  exercised  absolute 
control. 

The  Independents,  masters  of  the  army,  took  prompt 
measures ;  at  Naseby  they  crushed  the  last  army  of  the  king 
(1645).  Among  Charles'  baggage  they  found  proof  that,  in 
spite  of  his  declarations  to  the  contrary,  he  had  summoned 
the  aid  of  foreigners,  and  especially  of  the  Irish.  At  the 
same  time  Montrose  was  surprised  and  defeated  by  the 
Scotch  Covenanters.  Prince  Rupert  surrendered  Bristol 


CHAP.  XIX.]        ENGLAND  UNDER  CROMWELL.  3<>1 

without  striking  a  blow.  The  king  in  despair,  through 
weariness  rather  than  by  choice,  retired  to  the  Scotch  camp, 
where  the  French  minister  had  caused  him  to  hope  for  a 
shelter,  and  where  he  soon  learned  that  he  was  a  prisoner 
(1646).  The  Scotch  surrendered  him  to  Parliament  for 
^400,000  sterling  (1647). 

The  Presbyterians  and  the  Independents  had  with  diffi- 
culty acted  in  concert  during  the  struggle,  in  the  face  of 
danger;  it  was  much  worse  after  the  victory.  Since  the 
Presbyterians  predominated  in  Parliament  and  their  adver- 
saries in  the  army,  antagonism  broke  out  between  these  two 
bodies.  Parliament,  under  the  pretext  that  the  war  was 
finished,  wished  to  disband  a  portion  of  the  army.  Then  a 
threatening  agitation  manifested  itself  among  the  soldiers. 
The  army  addressed  petitions  to  the  Commons,  which  might 
pass  for  orders.  The  House  rejected  them  in  an  energetic 
manner.  "These  people,"  said  Cromwell,  "will  have  no 
rest  until  the  army  has  turned  them  out  by  the  ears."  He 
took  upon  himself  the  accomplishment  of  this  prediction. 

A  little  more  and  these  dissensions  would  have  caused 
Charles  to  regain  all  the  territory  which  he  had  lost.  The 
two  parties  contended  for  the  king.  A  detachment  of  the 
army  removed  him  from  Holmby,  where  he  was  at  the  dis- 
cretion of  Parliament.  Cromwell  and  the  Independent 
generals  opened  negotiations  with  him.  But  Charles  was 
not  sincere.  "Do  not  be  uneasy  about  the  concessions  that 
I  shall  make,"  he  wrote  to  the  queen.  "I  know  well,  when 
the  time  comes,  how  one  must  act  with  these  knaves,  and 
instead  of  a  silk  garter  I  will  adjust  a  hempen  one  for 
them."  Cromwell  intercepted  the  letter  and  from  that  day 
resolved  upon  the  king's  ruin.  Charles,  to  whom  he  sent 
some  threatening  advice,  escaped  and  took  refuge  in  the 
Isle  of  Wight,  of  which  the  governor  was  a  tool  of  Crom- 
well. 

This  flight  of  the  king  was  the  signal  to  the  Cavaliers  for 
a  new  seizure  of  arms  and  a  second  civil  war.  But  Crom- 
well, who  had  just  restored  discipline  among  his  soldiers  by 
intimidating  the  Levelers,  joyfully  seized  upon  the  oppor- 
tunity of  re-establishing  his  influence  by  the  war  He  con- 
quered the  royalists  in  Wales,  while  Fairfax  defeated  them 
near  London,  and  when  the  Scotch  attempted  an  invasion 
of  England  he  advanced  to  meet  them  and  crushed  them 
at  Preston. 


302  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

Meanwhile  the  Presbyterians,  bolder  in  his  absence, 
opened  new  negotiations  with  Charles  I.,  and  after  a  few 
conferences  proclaimed  through  the  House  of  Commons  that 
the  king's  concessions  afforded  a  sufficient  basis  for  them  to 
treat  for  peace.  Immediately  Cromwell  caused  the  prince 
to  be  removed  from  the  Isle  of  Wight  and  "purged"  Parlia- 
ment. All  the  Presbyterians  were  expelled;  the  assembly 
was  reduced  to  eighty  members,  and  no  voice  was  after- 
ward raised  to  disturb  the  Independent  party  in  its  victory. 
The  king's  trial  began.  Charles  appeared  before  a  high 
court  of  justice,  presided  over  by  John  Bradshaw,  Milton's 
cousin,  and  directed  by  Cromwell.  He  refused  to  recog- 
nize them  as  judges,  but  was  nevertheless  condemned,  and, 
in  spite  of  the  interference  of  the  Dutch  ambassadors,  exe- 
cuted. He  displayed  great  composure  upon  the  scaffold, 
regretting  of  all  his  acts  only  his  weakness  at  the  time  of 
Strafford's  trial.  "Heaven  forbid  that  I  should  complain," 
he  said.  "The  unjust  decision  whose  execution  I  permitted 
in  the  case  of  Strafford  is  requited  now  by  another  unjust 
decision"  (February  9,  1649). 

"In  no  long  time  it  became  manifest  that  those  political 
and  religious  zealots  to  whom  this  deed  is  to  be  ascribed 
had  committed  not  only  a  crime  but  an  error.  They  had 
given  to  a  prince  hitherto  known  to  his  people  chiefly  by 
his  faults  an  opportunity  of  displaying,  on  a  great  theater, 
before  the  eyes  of  all  nations  and  all  ages,  some  qualities 
which  irresistibly  call  forth  the  admiration  and  love  of  man- 
kind, the  high  spirit  of  a  gallant  gentleman,  the  patience 
and  meekness  of  a  penitent  Christian;  nay,  they  had  so  con- 
trived their  revenge  that  the  very  man  whose  whole  life  had 
been  a  series  of  attacks  on  the  liberties  of  England  now 
seemed  to  die  a  martyr  in  the  cause  of  those  very  liberties. 
No  demagogue  ever  produced  such  an  impression  on  the 
public  mind  as  the  captive  king,  who,  retaining  in  this  ex- 
tremity all  his  regal  dignity,  and  confronting  death  with 
dauntless  courage,  gave  utterance  to  the  feelings  of  his 
oppressed  people,  manfully  refused  to  plead  before  a  court 
unknown  to  the  law,  appealed  from  military  violence  to 
the  principles  of  the  constitution,  asked  by  what  right  the 
House  of  Commons  had  been  purged  of  its  most  respectable 
members  and  the  House  of  Lords  deprived  of  its  legisla- 
tive functions,  and  told  his  weeping  hearers  that  he  was 
defending  not  only  his  own  cause  but  theirs.  His  long  mis- 


CHAP.  XIX.]        ENGLAND  UNDER  CROMWELL.  3°3 

government,  his  innumerable  perfidies,  were  forgotten.  His 
memory  was  in  the  minds  of  the  great  majority  of  his 
subjects  associated  with  those  free  institutions  which  he 
had,  during  many  years,  labored  to  destroy;  for  those  free 
institutions  had  perished  with  him,  and,  amid  the  mournful 
silence  of  a  community  kept  down  by  arms,  had  been 
defended  by  his  voice  alone.  From  that  day  began  a 
reaction  in  favor  of  monarchy  and  of  the  exiled  house,  a 
reaction  which  never  ceased  till  the  throne  had  again  been 
set  up  in  all  its  old  dignity"  (Macaulay). 

The  Independents  had  proclaimed  the  Commonwealth. 
But  Scotland  protested.  She  now  remembered  that  the 
Stuarts  were  of  Scottish  race,  and  the  national 
wealth  of^Eng-  feeling  ran  so  high  at  the  news  of  Charles' 
land  (1649-60;).  execution  that  the  Duke  of  Argyle,  governor 
in  the  name  of  Parliament,  was  carried  away  by  it ;  Charles 
II., the  late  king's  eldest  son,  was  declared  King  of  Scotland, 
England,  France,  and  Ireland  on  condition  of  recognizing 
the  Covenant.  Charles  retired  to  The  Hague  in  Holland, 
refused  to  sign  the  clauses  they  wished  to  impose  upon  him, 
and  scorning  the  Scotch  Presbyterians,  went  to  his  mother, 
Henrietta,  in  France,  that  from  there  he  might  join  the  Irish 
royalists. 

It  was  all  over  with  the  English  government  and  the  Prot- 
estant oppression  of  Ireland  if  the  union  of  the  pretender 
and  the  rebels  was  effected.  The  English  Parliament 
hastened  to  appoint  Cromwell  Lord  Lieutenant  of  Ireland. 
He  was  not  willing  to  start  out  except  with  immense  forces. 
Besides  the  standing  army  of  45,000  men,  he  obtained  a 
body  of  12,000  veterans,  and  nothing  that  he  demanded 
was  refused,  either  money,  provisions,  or  stores.  The 
royalists  had  already  just  been  completely  routed  near  Dub- 
lin, at  the  battle  of  Rathmines.  Cromwell  was  able  to 
reap  the  fruits  of  this  great  victory,  and  opened  the  cam- 
paign by  the  siege  of  Drogheda.  The  city  was  taken  by 
storm;  the  whole  garrison  was  massacred;  more  than  a 
thousand  inhabitants  who  had  taken  refuge  in  the  cathe- 
dral suffered  the  same  fate.  These  horrible  scenes  were  re- 
peated a  month  later  at  Wexford.  Inhabitants,  soldiers,  all 
were  put  to  the  edge  of  the  sword.  Even  the  women  were 
killed  (1649).  Such  barbarity  drove  the  Irish  to  despair. 
Kilkenny  and  Clonmell  defended  themselves  with  such 
energy  that  the  lord  lieutenant  was  obliged  to  grant  them  an 


304  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

honorable  capitulation  (1650).  In  the  midst  of  his  suc- 
cesses, whose  glory  was  stained  with  blood,  Cromwell  was 
recalled  to  England  by  the  threatening  progress  of  the 
Scotch. 

The  disaster  at  Rathmines  had  prevented  Charles  from 
landing  in  Ireland,  and  had  forced  him  to  renew  negotia- 
tions with  the  Scotch  Presbyterians.  Before  accepting  the 
rigorous  conditions  at  the  price  of  which  they  offered  him 
the  crown  he  tried  to  conquer  it  by  the  sword  of  the  val- 
iant Marquis  of  Montrose.  This  heroic  man  had  landed  in 
Scotland  with  1200  men;  but  the  Highlanders  refused  to 
ally  themselves  with  him,  and  he  was  defeated  by  the  Pres- 
byterians at  Corbiesdale.  He  was  sentenced  to  be  hanged 
upon  a  gibbet  thirty  feet  high.  His  head  was  to  be  exposed 
upon  a  pike  in  Edinburgh,  his  arms  upon  the  gates  of  Perth 
and  Stirling,  his  legs  upon  those  of  Glasgow  and  Aberdeen. 
He  replied  that  he  gloried  in  his  fate,  and  only  regretted 
that  he  had  not  limbs  enough  to  furnish  every  city  in  the 
kingdom  with  a  proof  of  his  loyalty.  .As  a  last  disgrace  the 
executioner  had  suspended  around  his  neck  his  recent  proc- 
lamation with  the  story  of  his  early  exploits.  He  smiled, 
saying  that  his  enemies  gave  him  a  more  brilliant  decora- 
tion than  the  order  of  the  Garter,  with  which  his  sovereign 
had  honored  him.  Charles  II.  hastened  to  disavow  Mont- 
rose,  accepted  without  reserve  all  the  demands  of  the  Scotch 
ambassadors,  swore  never  to  allow  the  free  exercise  of  the 
Catholic  religion  in  Scotland, "or  in  any  part  of  his  domin- 
ions, and  immediately  left  Holland  to  take  possession  of  the 
throne  which  was  offered  to  him. 

Thus  the  alliance  of  the  king  and  the  Presbyterians  was 
finally  concluded  and  signed  over  the  corpse  of  the  most 
heroic  royalist  leader.  The  Independents  comprehended 
the  gravity  of  the  danger  and  recalled  Cromwell.  He 
crossed  the  Tweed  with  16,000  veteran  soldiers.  The 
Scotch  general,  David  Leslie,  in  spite  of  the  superior 
number  of  his  troops,  carefully  refrained  from  risking  a 
battle,  and  lay  obstinately  in  his  lines  for  a  month.  He 
wanted  to  wear  out  the  English  army;  but  the  mad  eager- 
ness of  the  Presbyterian  ministers  carried  the  day.  They 
forced  Leslie  to  the  attack.  The  engagement  took  place 
near  Dunbar.  At  the  first  onset  the  Independents  were 
overthrown;  Cromwell  with  his  troopers  renewed  the  fight, 
put  the  Scotch  completely  to  rout,  slew  3000  men,  captured 


CHAP.  XIX.]        ENGLAND  UNDER  CROMWELL.  305 

10,000  with  their  artillery,  stores,  and  baggage.  Edinburgh 
and  Leith  surrendered  without  resistance  (1650). 

The  defeat  at  Dunbar  was-more  advantageous  to  Charles 
II.  than  a  victory.  It  diminished  the  blind  austerity  of  the 
ministers,  and  made  the  king  cautious.  By  pretending  to 
love  the  Covenant  he  conciliated  the  Presbyterians;  by  giv- 
ing the  Hamiltons  the  preference  over  the  Campbells  he 
won  the  royalists.  Thus  the  two  parties  which  had  divided 
Scotland  for  a  century  united  under  the  banner  of  Charles 
II. — the  Presbyterians  because  they  believed  in  his  sincerity, 
the  royalists  because  they  had  no  faith  in  it.  He  was 
solemnly  crowned  at  Scone,  January  i,  1651. 

When  he  had  really  become  King  of  Scotland  and  master 
of  the  army  he  undertook  to  carry  the  war  into  the  very 
heart  of  England,  in  order  to  rally  on  the  way  the  nu- 
merous partisans  upon  whom  he  counted.  He  deceived 
Cromwell,  proceeded  rapidly  toward  the  south,  and  marched 
straight  upon  London.  But  the  English  royalists  did  not 
stir;  scarcely  a  few  thousand  Cavaliers  responded  to  the 
prince's  call,  and  Cromwell  gave  chase  with  40,000  men. 
Near  Worcester  the  encounter  took  place.  After  a  desper- 
ate struggle,  in  which  Charles  displayed  unusual  bravery, 
the  royal  army  was  dispersed  and  the  town  captured.  This 
was  on  September  3,  1651,  the  anniversary  of  the  victory 
at  Dunbar.  Charles  II.  escaped  his  enemies'  active 
search  only  by  miracle.  The  various  events  of  his  flight 
showed  at  the  same  time  his  coolness  and  the  tardy  devo- 
tion of  the  English  royalists.  Finally,  Scotland  was  sub- 
dued like  Ireland,  and  both  for  the  first  time. 

Thus  the  revolution  triumphed  at  home;  abroad  it 
declared  war  against  Holland.  The  Navigation  Act  was  a 
direct  attack  against  the  commerce  of  the  United  Provinces 
(October  9,  1651).  This  celebrated  act  closed  the  English 
ports  to  any  vessel  loaded  with  merchandise  which  was  not  a 
product  of  the  soil  or  of  the  national  labor  of  the  people 
under  whose  flag  the  ship  was  sailing,  and  also  prohibited 
the  importation  of  goods  from  Africa,  Asia,  or  America  upon 
any  but  English  vessels.  This  law,  which  made  the  naval 
greatness  of  England,  and  which  remained  in  force  until 
January  i,  1850,  deprived  the  Dutch,  "the  teamsters  of 
the  seas,"  as  they  were  called,  of  the  monopoly  of  naviga- 
tion, for  their  commerce  was  almost  exclusively  a  carrying 
trade.  The  tax  imposed  upon  herring  fishery,  which  the 


306  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

Dutch  carried  on  close  to  the  British  coast,  finally  em- 
broiled the  two  nations.  The  Dutch  protested;  they  could 
not  obtain  even  a  simple  delay,- and  the  decree  of  Parliament 
was  immediately  put  into  execution.  They  armed  to  pro- 
tect their  commerce.  The  English  straightway  began  hos- 
tilities, dreaming  of  nothing  less  than  the  annexation  of  the 
United  Provinces.  This  castle  in  the  air  crumbled  to 
pieces.  But  the  Dutch  fleets  were  unfortunate  in  spite  of 
the  genius  of  Tromp  and  Ruyter.  The  English  admiral, 
Blake,  raised  himself  to  a  level  with  these  illustrious  sea- 
men. He  defeated  Witt  and  Ruyter  northeast  of  Dover, 
October  8,  1852;  five  months  later  Tromp,  who  had  raised 
from  the  mainmast  of  his  vessel  an  immense  broom,  as  a 
sign  that  he  was  going  to  sweep  the  ocean,  \vas  worsted  in 
a  fight  lasting  three  days  through  the  whole  length  of  the 
Channel.  At  the  beginning  of  1654  the  two  republics, 
fearing  the  influence  of  the  house  of  Orange,  which  had 
just  been  united  by  marriage  with  the  house  of  the  Stuarts, 
concluded  peace. 

These  were  the  last  victories  won  under  the  auspices  of 
the  Commonwealth;  after  dissolving  Parliament  Cromwell 
had  caused  himself  to  be  named  Protector. 

Parliament  had  prepared  its  downfall  by  decimating 
itself;  it  no  longer  represented  the  nation,  but  a  party. 
The  malcontents,  and  they  included  nearly  everyone, 
desired  a  strong  government,  fewer  intrigues,  and  more 
honesty.  There  was  one  man  who  had  saved  both  liberty 
by  his  victories  over  the  royalists  and  social  order  by  crush- 
ing the  Levelers;  it  was  Oliver  Cromwell.  No  one  had  dis- 
played more  skill  in  following,  without  anticipating,  the 
prevailing  opinion.  He  was  sure  of  the  army,  he  won 
over  the  people  by  his  piety  and  even  counted  upon  the 
royalists,  who  preferred  seeing  sovereign  authority  usurped 
by  one  man  rather  than  exercised  by  the  nation.  Parlia- 
ment was  about  to  pass  an  act  of  prorogation ;  Cromwell 
rushed  to  the  assembly,  and  at  the  moment  of  taking  the  vote 
asked  to  be  heard.  According  to  his  custom  he  opened  with 
protestations  of  modesty  and  humility;  then  he  became 
animated  and  bitterly  attacked  their  acts.  He  was  inter- 
rupted. Then,  throwing  off  his  mask,  he  cried.  "You  are 
no  Parliament,  the  Lord  has  done  with  you."  And  as  they 
murmured  he  turned  to  each  one  of  the  members  in  suc- 
cession: "You,"  he  said,  "you  are  a  profligate;  you,  an 


CHAP.  XIX.]        ENGLAND  UNDER  CROMWELL.  307 

adulterer;  you,  a  drunkard.  Begone,  begone,  all  of  you!" 
And  at  each  reproach  he  stamped  his  foot.  This  was  the 
signal  agreed  upon;  soldiers  entered,  forced  the  represen- 
tatives from  their  seats,  and  drove  them  out  of  doors. 
When  the  hall  was  empty  Cromwell  went  out,  closed  the 
door,  put  the  key  into  his  pocket,  and  the  same  evening 
caused  this  notice  to  be  posted:  "House  to  let"  (April  30, 

1653)- 

Cromwell  then  formed  a  Parliament,  which  he  declared 
summoned  in  the  name  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  The  members, 
honest  but  narrow-minded  men,  took  matters  seriously  and 
wished  to  rule.  They  were  forced  to  dissolve.  The  Bare- 
bones  Parliament  was  no  more  fortunate  than  the  Rump 
Parliament.  Since  the  army  was  not  willing  to  endure  civil 
authority,  it  belonged  to  it  to  reorganize  the  government.  It 
was  childish  and  perhaps  dangerous  to  continue  the  hypoc- 
risy longer.  Cromwell  caused  himself  to  be  proclaimed 
Lord  Protector  (December  25,  1653).  Sovereign  power 
was  given  to  him;  he  was  king  save  in  name,  more  a  king 
than  any  legitimate  prince  had  ever  been,  for  he  had  an 
army  of  50,000  veteran  soldiers,  well  disciplined  and 
devoted  to  their  leader  even  to  death. 

Cromwell  continued  the  work  of  Parliament  in  Ireland. 
Ireton,  his  son-in-law  and  his  successor  in  the  command  of 
the  troops,  had  never  encountered  any  serious  resistance, 
thanks  to  his  enemies'  dissensions,  and  had  made  himself 
master  of  three-fourths  of  the  island  (1652).  Clanricarde, 
the  leader  of  the  rebels,  after  the  departure  of  the  Duke 
of  Ormond,  proposed  a  general  capitulation;  but  Ludlow, 
invested  \vith  the  command  on  account  of  the  premature 
death  of  Ireton,  refused  to  negotiate.  He  began  the  war 
again  with  new  energy  and  compelled  the  various  leaders 
of  the  revolt  to  submit  separately.  By  the  middle  of 
1652  Ireland  was  entirely  in  the  power  of  the  English.  It 
was  treated  with  horrible  cruelty.  Many  nobles,  accused 
of  taking  part  in  the  massacre  of  1640,  were  condemned  and 
executed;  40,000  soldiers  or  officers  were  exiled,  and  their 
wives  and  children  transported  to  America.  However,  in 
spite  of  all  these  butcheries  on  the  one  side,  and  the  con- 
tinual arrival  of  English  and  Scotch  colonists  on  the  other, 
it  was  found  that  the  Catholic  population  exceeded  the 
Protestant  in  the  ratio  of  8  to  i.  The  great  land  pro- 
prietors were  condemned  to  confiscation  of  all  their  prop- 


308  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

erty;  all  those  who  had  carried  arms  against  Parliament  to 
a  confiscation  of  two-thirds,  and  those  who  had  not  borne 
arms  for  Parliament  to  a  confiscation  of  one-third.  As  for 
those  whose  real  estate  and  personal  property  did  not  ex- 
ceed ten  pounds  sterling  in  value,  a  full  and  entire  amnesty 
was  generously  offered  them.  The  Irish  population 
received  orders  to  migrate  to  Connaught  before  the  ist  of 
May,  1654,  and  the  first  comer  had  the  privilege  of  killing 
any  Irishman  whom  he  might  find  upon  the  left  bank  of  the 
Shannon.  England  still  suffers  for  these  acts  of  violence 
from  the  sad  condition  in  which  Ireland  has  existed  during 
two  centuries. 

In  Scotland  Monk  was  charged  to  execute  the  will  both 
of  Parliament  and  Cromwell;  that  country  was  less  cruelly 
treated;  she  preserved  her  laws,  her  faith,  and  even  her 
national  existence.  For  Parliament  was  overthrown  at  the 
time  when  it  was  on  the  point  of  accomplishing  the  union 
of  the  two  peoples  of  Great  Britain;  and  Cromwell  aban- 
doned the  scheme. 

After  a  half  century,  during  which  England  had  had 
scarcely  more  weight  in  European  politics  than  Venice  or 
Saxony,  she  suddenly  became  a  formidable  power.  Crom- 
well treated  as  an  equal  with  all  the  sovereigns  of  Europe, 
saw  his  alliance  implored  by  Spain  and  sought  by  France, 
which  obtained  it  (1655).  The  Dutch  when  conquered 
had  been  compelled  to  recognize  the  supremacy  of  the 
English  flag  and  to  pay  the  expenses  of  the  war.  Blake 
penetrated  into  the  Mediterranean  with  his  fleet  and  chas- 
tised the  Barbary  states.  Jamaica  was  captured  from  Spain  ; 
so  too  was  Dunkirk,  after  the  victory  of  the  Dunes 
(1658),  gained  by  Turenne  and  his  English  auxiliaries;  and 
this  acquisition  consoled  the  nation  for  the  loss  of  Calais. 
Finally,  he  resumed  the  role  of  Elizabeth  which  the  Stuarts 
had  abandoned,  that  of  protector  of  the  Protestant  party. 
"All  the  Reformed  churches  scattered  over  Roman  Catho- 
lic kingdoms  acknowledged  Cromwell  as  their  guardian. 
The  Huguenots  of  Languedoc,  the  shepherds  who,  in  the 
hamlets  of  the  Alps,  professed  a  Protestantism  older  than 
that  of  Augsburg,  were  secured  from  oppression  by  the  mere 
terror  of  that  great  name.  The  Pope  himself  was  forced 
to  preach  humanity  and  moderation  to  popish  princes;  for 
a  voice  which  seldom  threatened  in  vain  had  declared  that, 
unless  favor  were  shown  to  the  people  of  God,  the  English 


CHAP.  XIX.]         ENGLAND  UNDER  CROMWELL.  3°9 

guns  should  be  heard  in  the  castle  of  St.  Angelo"  (Ma- 
caulay). 

"However,  this  government,  so  active  without  rashness, 
so  capable  of  flattering  the  national  passions  without  enslav- 
ing itself  to  them,  which  abroad  aggrandized  its  country 
without  compromising  it  and  maintained  order  at  home  with 
the  soldiers  of  the  revolution,  was  obeyed,  feared,  admired, 
but  not  firmly  rooted.  The  ancient  parties  always  existed, 
repressed  but  long-lived,  renouncing  neither  hope  nor  action. 
In  the  course  of  the  five  years  of  Cromwell's  rule  fifteen 
conspiracies  and  insurrections,  royalist  or  republican, 
alarmed  his  government  or  endangered  his  life.  Nothing, 
it  is  true,  succeeded  against  him;  all  the  plots  were  baffled, 
all  the  appeals  to  arms  suppressed.  The  country  did  not 
participate  in  them,  and  guarded  its  peacefulness.  But  it 
believed  neither  in  the  right  nor  in  the  duration  of  this 
power,  always  victorious.  At  the  zenith  of  his  greatness 
Cromwell  was  in  public  opinion  only  an  irresistible  but  pro- 
visional master,  without  a  rival  but  without  a  future" 
(Guizot).  He  died  September  3,  1658,  the  anniversary  of 
his  victories  at  Dunbar  and  Worcester.  He  was  fifty-five 
years  old. 

His  son  Richard  succeeded  him;  but  he  was  as  deficient 
in  ability  as  in  desire  to  rule.  Parties  again  arose;  Richard 
after  a  few  months  abdicated  (1660).  Then  England  fell 
into  profound  anarchy.  Parliament  and  the  army  contended 
for  power.  Cromwell  had  left  lieutenants  behind  him,  but 
no  successor.  All,  excellent  in  secondary  roles,  were  in- 
capable of  filling  the  highest  place.  The  most  skillful  was 
he  who  terminated  this  conflict  of  subordinate  ambitions  by 
imposing  upon  all  superiority  of  birth,  since  that  of  talent 
had  died  with  the  Protector.  George  Monk,  colleague  and 
rival  of  Blake  in  the  war  against  the  Dutch,  a  skillful  ad- 
ministrator in  Scotland,  decided  to  put  an  end  to  partisan 
conflicts  by  restoring  the  monarchy.  He  did  not  openly 
put  forward  his  enterprise;  he  made  use  of  duplicity 
and  deceived  everybody,  which  is  perhaps  a  shrewd  but 
hardly  a  moral  course  of  proceeding.  He  began  by  dissolv- 
ing the  Rump,  which  after  the  death  of  Cromwell  had  re- 
constituted itself,  and  he  replaced  that  worn-out  Parliament 
by  an  assembly  of  new  men,  inexperienced  but  docile  to  his 
guidance.  England  was  none  the  less  undecided,  doubtful  if 
a  genuine  republic  was  possible,  but  not  daring  to  abandon 


310  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE. 

the  name.  It  was  one  of  those  crises  in  which  the  most 
patient  wins.  The  republicans,  anxious  for  the  future,  and 
besides,  persecuted  in  the  person  of  their  leaders,  were 
unable  to  wait  and  took  up  arms;  they  were  easily  crushed, 
so  odious  had  civil  war  become.  No  safety  could  be  dis- 
covered save  in  a  return  to  the  former  system  of  government. 
Tories  and  Whigs  rallied  to  the  idea  and  re-established  the 
hereditary  monarchy  by  their  first  coalition.  They  were  to 
form  a  second  twenty-eight  years  later  for  the  establishment 
of  constitutional  liberty.  Charles  Stuart  was  in  fact  called 
back  without  conditions  (1660).  This  imprudence  pre- 
vented the  close  of  the  revolution,  because  none  of  the 
questions  which  it  had  raised  were  decided,  and  because 
this  return  to  the  past  was  soon  to  render  another  revolu- 
tion inevitable.  As  to  Monk,  he  obtained  the  title  of  Duke 
of  Albemarle  and  a  generous  pension. 


CHAPTER   XX. 

FRANCE  FROM    1643  to  1661.— CONDITION  OF  EUROPE 
IN  1661. 


Mazarin  and  the  Fronde. — War  with  Spain  ;  Treaty  of  the  Pyrenees 
(1659). — Condition  of  Europe  in  1661. 


AFTER  the  death  of  Louis  XIII.,  as  after  that  of  Henry 
IV.,  France  had  to  endure  the  evils  of  a  minority.  Louis 

XIV.  was  only  five  years  of  age. 

th^aparondeand  His  mother,  Anne  of  Austria,  caused  the 
regency  without  restriction  to  be  conferred 
upon  herself  by  Parliament  in  spite  of  the  will  of  Louis 
XIII.,  according  to  which  her  power  was  limited  by  a 
council.  She  gave  over  the  authority  to  Cardinal  Mazarin. 
The  latter  was  an  Italian,  born  in  1602,  of  an  old  Sicilian 
family  settled  at  Rome.  In  1634  sent  as  nuncio  to  France, 
he  had  attracted  the  notice  of  Richelieu,  who  had  interested 
himself  in  his  fortune,  and  had  obtained  for  him  the  Roman 
purple.  The  queen  intrusted  herself  to  this  guardian  of  the 
great  cardinal's  designs,  to  this  foreigner  who  could  have  no 
other  interest  in  France  than  that  of  the  king,  and  she 
allowed  him  to  gain  complete  mastery  over  her. 

Richelieu's  administration  had  had  too  many  enemies  and 
had  made  too  many  victims  to  prevent  a  reaction  from  set- 
ting in  after  his  death.  It  broke  out  in  earnest.  The 
prisoners  were  released,  the  exiles  returned  to  the  court,  and 
Anne  of  Austria  seemed  disposed  to  abandon  everything  to 
them.  Pensions,  indemnities,  privileges,  honors,  were  had 
for  the  asking.  "There  seemed  to  be  only  these  words  in 
the  French  language,"  said  the  Cardinal  of  Retz:  "  'The 
queen  is  so  good!'  '  Bethune,  La  Chatre,  the  Duke  of  .Beau- 
fort, made  a  show  of  high  pretensions;  also  Potier,  the 
Bishop  of  Beauvais,  whose  incapacity  was  well  known. 
Their  true  name,  "the  consequential  persons,"  was  soon 


312  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

found,  and  it  has  clung  to  them  ever  since.  Mazarin  expe- 
rienced little  difficulty  in  overthrowing  this  cabal.  The 
Duke  of  Beaufort  was  cast  into  the  Bastille,  the  Bishop  of 
Beauvais  was  sent  to  his  diocese,  the  Duchess  of  Chevreuse 
to  her  domains,  and  the  queen  appointed  Mazarin  prime 
minister  (1643). 

Thus  the  system  of  Richelieu  was  preserved;  his  ideas 
triumphed,  and  the  absolute  power  that  he  had  founded  sur- 
vived him.  Mazarin  had  only  to  continue  the  work  already 
begun'.  But  were  administrative  despotism  to  exist,  neces- 
sarily it  must  remain  intelligent,  enlightened,  devoted  to 
general  interests,  and  always  occupied  with  the  public  good. 
Mazarin  was  only  an  imperfect  Richelieu.  He  showed 
superior  genius  in  the  conduct  of  affairs  abroad,  but 
managed  the  finances  with  indifference  and  above  all  with 
unpardonable  dishonesty.  He  allowed  peculation  and  was 
himself  a  peculator.  The  disorder  became  such  that  the 
state  saw  itself  threatened  with  bankruptcy.  The  superin- 
tendent of  the  finances,  d'Emery,  did  not  shrink  from  any 
expedient;  an  edict  of  1548  prohibited  building  in  the 
suburbs  of  Paris  outside  of  certain  limits  under  pain  of 
demolition,  confiscation,  and  fine.  Time  had  annulled  this 
ordinance;  d'Emery  caused  it  to  be  revived,  and  thereby 
threatened  the  fortunes  of  a  multitude  of  landowners. 
This  edict  affected  only  the  burgesses;  the  edict  of  the 
tariff,  by  increasing  the  customs  duties  upon  food  and  mer- 
chandise, affected  everyone;  but  everyone  also  spoke  of 
what  the  fisher  Masaniello  was  doing  at  Naples,  inasmuch 
as  he  had  just  aroused  the  city  to  revolt  against  the  tax 
collectors,  and  "they  were  resolved  to  follow  the  example 
of  the  Neapolitans."  The  Parisian  populace  refused  to 
pay  the  new  taxes,  and  the  parliament*  of  Paris  became  its 

*  Between  the  English  and  French  parliaments  there  was  little  in 
common  save  a  misleading  similarity  of  name.  The  parliaments  of 
France  were  judicial  rather  than  political  bodies,  and  save  in  exceptional 
cases  had  nothing  to  do  with  legislation.  Out  of  the  thirteen  parliaments 
which  simultaneously  exercised  jurisdiction  in  France  during  the  seven- 
teenth century  that  of  Paris  was  by  far  the  most  important  and  its  early 
name  Royal  Council  or  Royal  Court  was  indicative  of  its  functions.  The 
other  parliaments  were  those  of  Toulouse,  founded  1303,  Grenoble,  1453  ; 
Bordeaux,  1462  ;  Dijon,  1476  ;  Rouen,  1499  '<  Aix,  T5O1  '.  Rennes,  1552  ; 
Pau,  1619  ;  Metz,  1632  ;  Dole,  1674  ;  Tournay,  and  Dombes.  All  were 
suppressed  by  decree  of  the  Constitutional  Assembly,  September  7, 
1790. — ED. 


CHAP.  XX.]         FRANCE  FROM  1643   TO  1661.  313 

mouthpiece.  The  registration  of  the  edicts  was  at  first 
opposed,  and  the  court,  after  many  struggles,  obtained  the 
levy  of  these  duties  for  only  two  years.  However,  the  needs 
of  the  state  were  continually  growing:  the  expenses  of  the 
war  against  the  house  of  Austria  must  be  met.  Mazarin 
demanded  of  the  sovereign  courts  four  years'  salary  as  a 
loan.  He  was  careful  to  except  Parliament.  But  the 
counselors  saw  in  this  pretended  favor  only  an  insult,  and 
declaring  themselves  conjointly  responsible  for  the  other 
courts,  passed  the  famous  decree  of  union.  The  Grand 
Council,  the  Court  of  Aids,  the  Court  of  Accounts,  and  Par- 
liament separately  appointed  a  commission.  The  four  com- 
missions assembled  in  the  chamber  of  St.  Louis,  and 
organized  themselves  into  a  deliberative  assembly.  They 
stated  their  demands  in  twenty-seven  articles,  and  presented 
them  for  the  acceptance  of  the  queen  regent.  The  twenty- 
seven  articles  contained  a  complete  revolution.  Parliament 
assigned  to  itself  the  right  of  discussing  and  registering 
all  edicts,  of  prosecuting  unfaithful  officers,  and  finally 
demanded  that  no  subject  of  the  king  should  he  held  in 
custody  more  than  twenty  four-hours  without  obtaining  a 
hearing.  This  was  substituting  for  the  absolute  monarchy 
a  monarchy  limited  by  an  oligarchy  of  200  magistrates  who 
bought  their  offices.  The  parliament  of  Paris,  deceived 
as  to  its  true  power  by  similarity  of  name,  thought  itself 
able  to  play  the  role  of  the  English  Parliament.  "The  star 
was  then  terrible  against  the  kings"  (Mme  de  Mottville). 
At  that  very  moment  the  Duke  of  Enghien  was  gaining 
the  victory  of  Lens.  This  great  success  emboldened 
Mazarin;  while  the  Te  Deum  was  being  chanted  at  Notre- 
Dame  he  caused  the  arrest  of  three  counselors,  Broussel, 
Charton,  and  Blancmenil,  who  were  very  popular  on  account 
of  their  opposition  to  the  court.  At  the  rumor  of  this 
arrest  the  people  flew  to  arms;  in  less  than  three  hours  200 
barricades  were  built,  and  100,000  fighting  men  surrounded 
the  Palais  Royal,  demanding  the  liberty  of  Broussel.  In 
a  body  Parliament  marched  to  the  queen  across  the  barri- 
cades, which  fell  before  it,  and  demanded  its  imprisoned 
members,  but  could  obtain  nothing.  Anne  of  Austria 
wished  to  resist  to  the  last;  the  entreaties  of  Mazarin,  who 
told  her  that  she  was  as  brave  as  a  soldier  who  did  not 
know  the  danger,  and  the  counsels  of  the  Queen  of  Eng- 
land influenced  her  to  yield.  Calm  immediately  was 


314  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

restored,  and  "all  the  city  seemed  quieter  than  on  Good 
Friday." 

But  the  queen,  irritated  at  what  she  regarded  as  an  act 
of  weakness,  quitted  Paris  with  her  son  and  Mazarin  and 
retired  to  St.  Germain.  This  departure  had  the  appear- 
ance of  flight.  Anne  of  Austria  was  none  the  less  con- 
strained to  confirm  all  the  decrees  rendered  by  the  chamber 
of  St.  Louis;  it  was  the  same  day  on  which  the  peace  of 
Westphalia  had  been  signed  (October  24,  1648).  Parliament 
found  itself  invested,  as  it  were,  with  legislative  power,  and 
compared  itself  to  the  members  of  the  English  Parliament, 
the  choice  and  representatives  of  the  nation. 

In  yielding  the  prime  minister  had  wanted  only  to  gain 
time;  when  he  was  freed  from  foreign  war  he  resolved  to 
end  that  faction  of  "the  king's  subjects  who  assassinated 
royal  authority."  January  6,  1649,  Anne  of  Austria 
again  quitted  Paris  with  her  children,  and  called  the  troops 
around  her.  Parliament,  incapable  single-handed  of  strug- 
gling against  the  court,  demanded  or  accepted  the  services 
of  the  princes  and  young  lords,  who  could  amuse  themselves 
with  a  civil  war  under  a  minister  who  did  not  know  how  to 
make  their  heads  fall.  These  were  the  Prince  of  Conti,  a 
brother  of  the  great  Conde,  the  Duke  of  Longueville,  who 
had  married  their  sister,  the  Duke  of  Bouillon,  who  always 
regretted  Sedan,  the  Duke  of  Rochefoucauld,  and  also  the 
sage  Turenne,  influenced  by  his  brother  and  by  the  Duchess 
of  Longueville.  The  soul  of  the  plot  was  Paul  of  Gondi, 
then  coadjutor  of  his  uncle,  Archbishop  of  Paris,  and  later 
Cardinal  Retz.  He  was  a  man  of  easy  morals  despite  his 
robe,  but  of  exhaustless  wit,  and  aspired  to  succeed  Riche- 
lieu. He  thought  he  possessed  capability  of  greatness, 
and  he  made  others  think  so  too;  circumstances  proved  him 
to  be  only  a  blunderer.  Gondi  governed  Paris  with  ser- 
mons, alms,  and  couplets.  He  won  over  the  Duke  of  Beau- 
fort, grandson  of  Henry  IV.,  and  also  tried  to  win  Conde; 
but  the  prince  proudly  replied  to  his  advances:  "My  name 
is  Louis  of  Bourbon,  and  I  do  not  wish  to  disturb  the 
crown." 

The  struggle  which  then  began  merited  the  name  be- 
stowed on  it  by  history,  the  Fronde,  from  a  sort  of  child's 
game.  Parliament  appointed  generals,  and  each  one  taxed 
himself  to  raise  troops.  Twenty  counselors,  appointed  by 
Richelieu,  each  gave  15,000  francs  to  obtain  toleration  from 


CHAP.  XX.]         FRANCE  FROM  1643    TO  1661.  315 

their  colleagues,  and  those  who  had  found  neither  a  coin 
nor  a  soldier  for  the  government  mustered  10,000,000  francs 
and  12,000  men.  By  a  decree  of  Parliament  every  car- 
riage entrance  furnished  a  man  and  a  horse.  This  cavalry 
was  called  the  cavalry  of  the  carriage  entrances.  The 
coadjutor,  the  titular  Archbishop  of  Corinth,  had  a  regiment 
which  was  named  the  Corinthian  regiment;  this  regiment 
being  beaten,  its  defeat  was  called  "the  first  to  the  Corin- 
thians." The  twenty  counselors  who  had  furnished  each 
15,000  francs  had  no  other  honor  than  that  of  being  called 
the  "Fifteen-twenties."* 

The  king's  people  were  the  first  who  desired  to  withdraw 
from  this  squabble.  They  had  very  quickly  recognized  the 
fact  that  the  nobles  were  seeking  to  continue  the  disorder  only 
to  overturn  the  state.  When  Parliament  learned  that  the 
nobles  had  signed  a  treaty  with  Spain,  the  most  obstinate 
were  influenced  by  this  treason.  Mathieu  Mole  was  com- 
missioned to  treat  with  Mazarin.  The  Convention  of  Ruel 
diminished  certain  taxes,  authorized  the  convocation  of  the 
Chambers,  and  after  some  hesitation  brought  back  the  court 
to  Paris  (April,  1649). 

The  peace  did  not  last  long.  Conde  wished  to  rule  the 
government  which  he  had  protected.  He  wearied  the 
queen  regent  and  the  prime  minister  by  continual  demands; 
he  humiliated  them  by  insolence  and  familiarity.  He 
wrote  to  the  cardinal:  "All*  illustrissimo  Signer  Faquino;" 
he  said  to  him  one  day  in  taking  leave  of  him:  "Adieu, 
Mars!"  At  the  same  time  that  he  alienated  the  court  he 
discontented  the  former  members  of  the  Fronde;  he  spoke 
only  scornfully  of  those  citizens  who  pretended  to  govern 
the  state;  he  gathered  around  him  young  lords,  vain  and  pre- 
sumptuous, who  carried  their  leader's  failings  to  excess,  and 
who  were  called  the  "little  masters."  It  was  not  difficult 
for  Mazarin  to  unite  everyone  against  this  prince  "who 
knew  better  how  to  win  battles  than  hearts";  and  he  had 
him  arrested  in  the  Louvre  with  his  brother,  the  Prince  of 
Conti,  and  his  stepbrother,  the  Duke  of  Longueville  (Jan- 
uary, 1650). 

An"  uprising  broke  out  in  some  of  the  provinces,  but  it 
was  easily  suppressed.  Bordeaux  surrendered;  du  Plessis- 

*  A  pun  likening  the  twenty  counselors  to  the  beggar  inmates  of  the 
Blind  Asylum  of  Quinze-vingts,  or  the  Fifteen-twenties. — ED. 


316  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

Praslin  at  Rethel  defeated  Marshal  Turenne,  who  had  just 
invaded  Champagne  with  a  Spanish  army  (December,  1650). 
But  Mazarin  thought  himself  victor  too  soon.  He  had 
promised  the  coadjutor  a  cardinal's  cap  in  order  to  attach 
him  to  the  queen's  interests;  afterward  he  forgot  his  promise, 
according  to  his  custom.  The  coadjutor  rejoined  the  party 
of  Conde,  revived  the  distrust  of  Parliament,  and  agitated 
the  people;  and  the  two  Frondes,  momentarily  united  by 
their  needs,  forced  Anne  of  Austria  to  surrender  the  princes 
and  banish  her  prime  minister  from  the  kingdom.  Mazarin 
retired  to  Cologne,  and  in  his  exile  continued  to  govern  the 
queen  and  France  (February,  1651).  Retz  at  last  received 
the  cardinal's  hat. 

Conde  could  not  long  agree  with  his  new  allies.  He  had 
imagined  that  the  queen  would  make  him  all-powerful  as 
amends  for  his  thirteen  months  of  captivity;  and  yet  Mazarin 
governed  from  the  depths  of  his  exile.  Irritated  at  the 
isolation  in  which  he  was  placed,  he  rushed  into  more 
culpable  adventures.  He  started  for  the  south,  resolved  to 
conquer  by  force  of  arms  the  power  and  perhaps  even  the 
throne,  if  we  believe  the  memoirs  of  one  of  his  companions 
in  revolt,  the  Count  of  Coligny.  He  excited  Guyenne  to 
insurrection,  and  opened  negotiations  with  Spain,  while  his 
friends  were  fomenting  war  in  the  center  of  France.  Maza- 
rin, who  had  immediately  returned  to  France  (December, 
1651),  intrusted  the  command  of  the  troops  to  the  Viscount 
Turenne,  who  had  rejoined  the  royal  side.  The  marshal 
directed  his  forces  toward  the  Loire  to  surprise  the  prince's 
army.  It  was  thought  that  Conde  was  a  hundred  leagues 
away;  but  he  traveled  over  half  of  France  on  horseback, alone 
and  in  disguise.  Immediately  on  his  arrival  he  made  an 
attack  upon  the  troops  of  Marshal  Hocquincourt  at  Bleneau, 
and  dispersed  them  (April,  1652).  The  fugitives  took 
refuge  at  Briare  with  Turenne.  The  latter  rode  at  full  speed 
to  an  eminence  whence  he  could  overlook  the  plain;  by  the 
light  of  the  burning  villages  he  observed  the  arrangement  of 
the  troops,  and  said:  "The  prince  has  arrived,  and  is  in  com- 
mand of  his  army."  The  court,  in  terror,  meditated  flight  to 
Bourges;  Turenne  restored  courage,  and  by  dint  of  audacity 
and  prudence  with  4000  men  against  12,000  prevented  the 
enemy  from  following  up  their  advantage.  "Marshal,"  said 
the  queen,  weeping,  "you  have  saved  the  state;  without  you 
every  town  would  have  closed  its  gates  to  the  king." 


CHAP.  XX.]          FRANCE  FROM  1643   TO  1661.  3*7 

For  whom  would  Paris  declare?  This  the  armies  de- 
manded of  the  Parisians  themselves ;  they  refused  to  allow 
either  of  the  two  parties,  who  had  met  at  the  suburb  St. 
Antoine,  to  enter  their  city.  The  battle  was  bloody  and 
for  a  long  time  indecisive.  Finally,  when  the  army  of  the 
Fronde,  menaced  upon  its  flanks,  was  on  the  point  of  being 
surrounded  and  destroyed,  Mademoiselle,  daughter  of 
Gaston  of  Orleans,  opened  the  gates  to  Conde,  and  the 
cannon  in  the  Bastille  were  fired  upon  the  royal  troops. 
Turenne  withdrew  astounded.  But  Conde  could  not  re- 
main long  in  Paris,  where  his  glory  was  stained  by  a  mas- 
sacre of  the  party  of  Mazarin,  which  took  place  with  his 
permission  if  not  by  his  order.  He  left  the  city  October 
10,  and  retired  to  Flanders,  among  the  Spaniards. 

To  hasten  the  return  of  the  king's  early  popularity 
Mazarin  withdrew  a  second  time  (August  9).  Thereupon 
Parliament  and  the  citizens  entreated  the  queen  mother  to 
re-enter  the  town,  now  at  peace  (October  21),  whence  Conde" 
had  departed  three  days  before.  Some  of  the  magistrates 
were  dismissed  or  imprisoned  ;  the  Cardinal  of  Retz  was  con- 
fined at  Vincennes,  the  Prince  of  Conde  condemned  in 
contumacy,  and  Gaston  exiled  to  Blois.  Three  months  later 
Mazarin  returned  all-powerful  and  in  the  gorgeous  apparel 
of  a  sovereign  (February,  1653).  This  was  the  end  of  the 
Fronde.  But  those  times,  in  which  the  king  and  his  mother 
fled  in  disorder  before  a  few  blunderheads,  and  slept  almost 
upon  straw  at  St.  Germain,  left  an  impression  upon  the 
mind  of  Louis  XIV.  which  was  never  effaced;  this  recollec- 
tion contributed  to  drive  him  into  the  path  of  the  most  abso- 
lute government.  On  his  return  to  Paris  he  caused  a  dec- 
laration of  authority  to  be  registered,  containing  a  "very 
express  prohibition  against  the  assumption  by  Parliament 
hereafter  of  any  cognizance  of  the  general  affairs  of  the  state 
and  of  the  direction  of  the  finances." 

The  war  of  the  Fronde  was  ended.  It  remained  to  termi- 
nate the  war  with  Spain,  which  during  these  troubles  had 
captured  Dunkirk,  Barcelona,  and  Casale  in 

War  with     T    l.  „         ,  .    ,       , f      «•         j     ,       i  •  •         v  • 

Spain;  Treaty  Italy.  Conde  had  offered  to  his  enemies  his 
(i659)e  Pyrenees  sword,  which  had  been  so  fatal  to  them;  but 
he  seemed  to  lose  his  good  fortune  in  quitting 
France.  At  first  he  joined  the  Archduke  Leopold  in  the 
siege  of  Arras,  not  far  from  the  plains  of  Lens,  where  he  had 
won  his  most  glorious  victory.  Turenne  attacked  him  in  his 


3 1 8  THE  A  SCENDEXC  Y  OF  FRA  NCE.          [  BOOK  V. 

camp  and  forced  his  lines.  An  orderly  retreat  was  all  that 
Conde  could  effect  (August  25,  1654).  "I  know,"  Philip 
IV.,  the  King  of  Spain,  wrote  to  him,  "that  everything  was 
lost,  and  that  you  have  saved  everything." 

The  years  1655  and  1656  saw  only  the  sieges  of  frontier 
towns — Valenciennes,  Cambrai,  and  Rocroy,  and  the  skillful 
maneuvers  of  Turenne  and  Conde;  but  these  two  generals, 
having  only  small  armies  available,  could  not  strike  decisive 
blows.  Mazarin  was  as  destitute  of  royalist  scruples  as 
Richelieu  had  been  of  religious  scruples.  His  predecessor 
had  allied  himself  with  the  Protestants  against  Austria:  he 
allied  himself  against  Spain  with  Cromwell,  who  had 
caused  the  son-in-law  of  Henry  IV.  to  be  beheaded  (1657). 
Then  Spain  experienced  only  reverses.  While  the  English 
were  taking  possession  of  Jamaica  and  burning  the  galleons 
of  Cadiz,  the  town  of  Dunkirk,  the  key  of  Flanders,  was 
besieged  by  land  and  by  sea.  The  Spaniards  advanced  to 
its  relief  along  the  dunes  which  border  the  sea.  "Have 
you  ever  seen  a  battle?"  asked  Conde  of  the  young  Duke  of 
Gloucester,  stationed  near  him.  "No,"  replied  the  young 
prince.  "Well,  then,  in  half  an  hour  you  will  see  how  one 
is  lost."  Turenne's  victory  was  complete  (June  14,  1658). 
Dunkirk  was  its  prize,  but  the  town  was  put  into  the  hands 
of  the  English  according  to  the  conditions  of  the  treaty. 

The  cabinet  of  Madrid  had  no  army;  it  sued  for  peace. 
The  negotiations,  commenced  at  Paris  by  ambassadors,  were 
finished  by  the  two  ministers,  Mazarin  and  Don  Louis  de 
Haro,  in  the  island  of  conference,  upon  the  Bidassoa,  at  the 
foot  of  the  mountains  which  separate  the  two  countries. 
This  was  the  treaty  of  the  Pyrenees,  signed  November  7, 
1659.  France  retained  Artois,  Cerdagne,  and  Roussillon, 
which  Richelieu  had  conquered;  she  surrendered  Lorraine 
to  the  duke  Charles  IV.  on  condition  that  he  would  dis- 
mantle all  his  strongholds,  and  as  he  refused,  France  kept 
his  duchy;  the  Prince  of  Conde  was  restored  to  favor  and 
re-established  in  his  principal  offices;  finally,  Louis  XIV. 
married  the  infanta  Maria  Theresa,  who  was  to  bring  him 
a  dowry  of  500,000  gold  crowns,  in  consideration  of  which 
she  renounced  all  claim  to  her  father's  heritage. 

The  conclusion  of  this  marriage  was  the  thought  and  hope 
of  Mazarin  during  fifteen  years.  As  early  as  1645  ne  wrote 
to  his  plenipotentiaries  at  the  Congress  of  Westphalia:  "If 
his  Most  Christian  Majesty  married  the  infanta,  then  we 


CHAP.  XX.]          FRANCE  FROM  1643   TO  1661.  319 

could  aspire  to  the  Spanish  succession,  no  matter  what  re- 
nunciation the  infanta  makes;  and  this  would  not  be  a  very 
distant  expectation,  since  she  is  excluded  only  by  the  prince, 
her  brother."  In  1659  he  arranged  matters  in  such  away 
that  the  renunciation  was  legally  null :  he  subordinated  with 
an  express  purpose  its  validity  to  the  exact  payment  of  the 
dowry,  which  he  knew  Spain  could  never  pay.  It  was  to 
prepare  a  pretext  in  future  for  the  pretensions  of  the  house 
of  Bourbon.  But  by  this  same  treaty  Mazarin  abandoned 
Portugal,  which,  deprived  of  the  support  of  France,  sought 
the  support  of  England,  an  alliance  to  be  twice  fatal  to  the 
French,  under  Louis  XIV.  and  under  Napoleon. 

At  the  same  time  that  the  cardinal  meditated  the  union 
of  Spain  and  France  he  had  for  a  moment  thought  of  mak- 
ing Louis  XIV.  emperor  at  the  death  of  Ferdinand  III. 
(1657).  Leopold  I.  had  been  chosen.  However,  he  con- 
cluded the  League  of  the  Rhine  (1658),  by  which  the  three 
ecclesiastical  electors,  the  Duke  of  Bavaria,  the  princes  of 
Brunswick  and  Hesse,  the  kings  of  Sweden  and  Denmark, 
united  with  France  for  the  maintenance  of  the  treaties  of 
Westphalia,  and  were  placed  in  some  degree  under  its  pro- 
tectorate. The  League  of  the  Rhine,  which  was  afterward 
revived  and  extended  by  Napoleon  under  the  name  of  the 
Confederation  of  the  Rhine,  assured  to  France  ascendancy 
in  the  empire. 

After  the  achievement  of  these  great  undertakings  the 
Cardinal  Mazarin  could  say  that  "if  his  language  was  not 
French  his  heart  was." 

His  internal  administration  merits  less  praise.  He  neg- 
lected commerce  and  agriculture;  he  allowed  the  navy  to 
decline;  he  managed  the  finances  in  such  a  way  that  at  his 
death  the  public  treasury  owed  450,000,000  francs,  while  his 
own  fortune  amounted  to  almost  half  of  that  sum,  so  the 
superintendent,  Nicolas  Fouquet,  said  to  the  king:  "Sire, 
there  is  no  money  in  your  Majesty's  coffers,  but  his  Highness 
the  Cardinal  will  lend  you  some."  However,  a  part  of  these 
immense  riches  was  honorably  employed.  Mazarin  pro- 
tected men  of  letters,  and  Menage  was  commissioned  to 
furnish  him  with  a  list  of  those  who  merited  reward  or 
encouragement.  Descartes,  in  retirement  in  Holland,  re- 
ceived a  pension;  the  historian  Mezeray  was  also  to  receive 
4000  francs.  At  great  expense  and  by  the  labors  of  the 
scholar  Gabriel  Naude  the  cardinal  founded  a  magnificent 


320  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

library,  the  Mazarin  Library,  afterward  opened  to  the 
public;  and  in  his  will  he  appropriated  800,000  crowns  for 
the  establishment  of  the  College  of  the  Four  Nations, 
designed  to  receive  the  pupils  of  the  university  who 
belonged  to  the  Spanish,  Italian,  German,  and  Flemish 
provinces  newly  reunited  to  the  kingdom.  Finally,  he  had 
a  taste  for  art,  intense  if  not  the  most  refined;  he  had  a 
number  of  pictures,  statues,  and  curiosities  brought  from 
Italy,  also  engineers  and  actors  who  introduced  the  opera 
into  France.  In  1655  he  founded  the  Academy  of  Painting 
and  Sculpture. 

He  died  March  9,  1661,  at  Vincennes,  at  the  age  of  fifty- 
nine,  in  despair  at  leaving  his  beautiful  paintings,  his 
statues,  books,  business,  life,  and  yet  "facing  death  cheer- 
fully." 

While  the  treaties  of  Westphalia  and  the  Pyrenees  gave 
France  the  first  place  among  the  European  nations,  the 
internal  opposition  which  had  up  to  that  time 
'iWi!'  hampered  the  exercise  of  the  royal  power  and 
rendered  useless  the  immense  resources  of  the 
country  found  itself  worsted.  If  obstacles  are  removed  at 
home  the  way  is  open  and  plain  abroad.  Louis  XIV.  had 
only  to  continue  the  work  of  Richelieu  and  Mazarin.  He 
had  able  ministers,  a  kingdom  the  most  united,  the  best 
situated,  and  the  most  docile  in  Europe,  finances  that  Col- 
bert was  to  put  in  order,  an  army  which  Louvois  was  to 
organize  under  the  greatest  generals  of  the  world,  and 
behind  that  army  a  valiant  nation  of  20,000,000  souls.  His 
power  was  great;  moreover,  it  was  still  farther  augmented  by 
the  weakness  of  his  neighbors.  To  convince  ourselves  of 
this  let  us  make  a  rapid  survey  of  Europe. 

The  restoration  of  the  Stuarts  in  1660  had  brought  back 
quiet  to  England,  but  only  for  a  few  years.  The  absolutist 
tendencies  of  the  king  and  the  liberal  aspirations  of  the 
English  nation  were  in  manifest  opposition.  In  reality 
England  was  always  divided  into  two  parties,  the  one 
defending  the  public  liberty,  the  other  upholding  the  prin- 
ciples of  divine  right,  or  at  least  entirely  willing  to  increase 
the  prerogatives  of  the  crown.  For  defense  against  the  first 
Charles  II.  was  led  more  than  once  to  betray  the  honor  and 
interests  of  England,  as,  for  example,  when  he  sold  Dunkirk 
to  France  for  5,000,000  francs,  and  when  he  sold  himself  to 
Louis  XIV.  for  a  pension.  The  Navigation  Act,  promul- 


CHAP.  XX.]          CONDITION  OF  EUROPE  IN  1661.  321 

gated  in  1652,  had  already  excited  the  anger  of  the  Dutch 
by  showing  them  that  England  intended  to  control  her  own 
carrying  trade,  whereof  up  to  that  time  they  had  had  all  the 
profit.  Scotland,  attached  to  England  at  the  accession  of 
James  in  1603,  formed  with  her  and  with  Ireland  the 
United  Kingdom  of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland.  *- — ^ 

The  seven  United  Provinces  had  attained  the  zenith  of  / 
their  greatness.  In  1648  the  house  of  Austria  had  recog- 
nized their  independence,  and  had  ceded  to  them  several 
districts  of  Brabant,  Luxemburg,  and  Flanders.  The 
strength  of  the  republic  lay  in  its  possession  of  the  mouths 
of  the  Scheldt,  Meuse,  Rhine,  and  Ems,  with  the  impor- 
tant town  of  Maestricht,  which  protected  its  frontier.  In 
the  Indies  they  had  almost  wholly  supplanted  the  Portu- 
guese. Masters  without  rivals  of  those  regions,  they  had 
divided  their  domains  into  five  governments:  Java,  where 
about  1619  they  had  founded  Batavia,  the  capital  of  all 
their  settlements,  Amboyna  and  Ternate  in  the  Moluccas, 
Ceylon  and  Macassar  in  the  Celebes  Islands.  Their  colony 
on  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  made  them  masters  of  the  route 
from  Europe  to  the  Indies,  and  they  also  had  colonies  in 
the  Antilles. 

Rulers  of  the  seas,  they  explored  their  extent;  Lemaire 
discovered  the  strait  which  bears  his  name,  and  doubled 
Cape  Horn,  a  safer  route  than  the  Strait  of  Magellan  (1615). 
Several  nations,  France  included,  disputed  the  priority  of 
the  discovery  of  Australia,  but  it  is  certain  that  the  first 
positive  knowledge  is  due  to  the  Dutch.  They  between 
1605  and  1642  sent  along  its  coasts  several  exploring  expe- 
ditions, of  which  the  most  important  were  those  of  Tasman 
in  1642  and  1644,  who  on  his  first  voyage  discovered  Van 
Diemen's  Land,  New  Zealand,  the  Viti  and  Friendly  Isl- 
ands, and  in  his  second  took  the  bearings  of  the  northwest 
coast  of  Australia.  As  yet  no  power  rivaled  the  Dutch 
in  the  art  of  naval  construction.  No  people  could  carry 
freight  at  lower  rates;  for  no  other  sailors  were  contented 
with  so  small  wages.  To  the  rich  products  of  the  commerce 
of  the  Indies  must  be  added  those  of  the  herring  fisheries, 
and  above  all  we  must  reckon  as  principal  elements  of  their 
prosperity  the  activity,  the  extraordinary  spirit  of  order  and 
economy,  which  is  one  of  the  distinctive  traits  of  Dutch 
genius.  But  the  basis  of  this  sudden  greatness  was  perhaps 
too  narrow  for  it  to  be  very  solid.  Holland  had  too  limited 


322  THE  A  SCENDENC  Y  OF  FRA  NCE.          [  BOOK  V. 

a  territory  and  too  small  a  population  to  control  so  vast  an 
empire.  Freed  by  the  co-operation  of  France,  she  began  to 
find  that  her  ally  had  grown  very  strong,  and  inclined  toward 
enfeebled  and  humiliated  Spain,  preferring  her  for  a  neighbor 
to  victorious  France.  She  was  to  make  herself  the  principal 
antagonist  of  the  great  king,  and  subsidize  coalitions  against 
him.  But  the  Spanish  Netherlands  were  to  prove  an  inse- 
cure rampart,  which  Louis  XIV.,  when  provoked,  could 
break  through  or  flank  to  convey  his  armies  to  the  very  heart 
of  the  United  Provinces.  England  was  to  prove  still  more 
fatal  to  her  by  her  alliance  than  France  by  war.  The  Long 
Parliament  began  her  ruin  by  the  Navigation  Act,  and 
Cromwell  had  already  forced  her  to  recognize  the  superiority 
of  the  British  flag;  but  when  the  Stadtholder  of  Holland, 
William  of  Nassau,  became  King  of  England,  Holland, 
according  to  the  saying,  was  only  a  boat  fastened  alongside 
a  ship  of  the  line. 

Spain,  ruined  in  the  very  sources  of  her  wealth  by  the 
\  expulsion  of  200,000  Moors  in  1609,  had  been  exhausted  by 
i  long  and  unsuccessful  wars.  She  retained  all  her  territories, 
I  Franche-Comte,  half  the  Netherlands,  the  Milanais,  the  king- 
dom of  the  Two  Sicilies,  the  islands  of  Elba  and  Sardinia; 
but  the  possession  of  these  countries  was  onerous  rather 
than  profitable,  for  they  did  not  bring  in  what  they  cost. 
She  had  recently  lost  Roussillon,  Artois,  and  also  Portugal; 
her  immense  colonies  in  America  remained  to  her  and  con- 
tinued to  send  her  their  galleons;  but  her  agriculture  was 
neglected,  her  industry  and  her  commerce  were  dead,  and 
the  American  piastres  served  only  to  buy  what  she  no  longer 
knew  how  to  produce.  Philip  IV.  still  reigned.  For 
twenty  years  he  had  been  under  the  guardianship  of  Oliva- 
rez.  At  this  time  Spain  had  nothing  to  boast  of  save  her 
poets  and  artists;  Lope  de  Vega  (1635)  and  Velasquez 
(1660)  had  just  died.  But  Calderon  and  Murillo  were 
already  celebrated.  France,  who  was  beginning  her  great 
century  of  arts  and  letters  with  Corneille,  Descartes,  Pascal, 
and  Poussin  was  to  ravish  this  glory  from  her  as  she  had 
already  ravished  her  power. 

Spain  had  involved  Portugal  in  her  ruin.  Despoiled  by 
the  Dutch  of  her  colonies  and  commerce,  abandoned  by 
France  in  the  treaty  of  the  Pyrenees,  she  began  to  look 
toward  England,  into  whose  arms  she  was  to  cast  herself 
after  a  Bourbon  was  seated  upon  the  throne  of  Charles  V. 


CHAP.  XX.]          CONDITION  OF  EUROPE  IN  1661.  323 

In  Italy,  which  Spain  held  by  two  extremities,  Naples 
and  Milan,  and  by  the  islands  of  Sicily,  Sardinia,  and  Elba, 
the  same  decline.  The  great  movement  of  Catholic  restora- 
tion which  had  animated  the  peninsula  in  the  century  pre- 
ceding had  been  arrested.  The  pontiffs  had  returned  to 
temporal  ambitions,  but  without  obtaining  a  better  guarantee 
for  the  tranquillity  of  the  states  of  the  Church,  extending 
from  Carigliano  to  the  mouths  of  the  Po,  where  since  the 
death  of  Sixtus  V.  the  bravi  swarmed.  Richelieu  and  Ma- 
zarin  had  tried  in  vain  several  times  to  form  a  league  of  the 
Italian  princes  against  Spain,  which  held  them  in  dependence. 
Philip  IV.  in  spite  of  his  weakness  triumphed  over  the  ill 
will  of  several  princes,  suppressed  a  revolt  in  Sicily  under 
the  gold  beater  Giuseppe  d'Alesio  (1647),  and  two  more 
important  movements  which  broke  out  the  same  year  in 
Naples  under  Masaniello,  the  fisherman,  and  Gennaro  An- 
nese,  the  armorer.  All  that  Mazarin  could  do  was  to  cause 
Vercelli  to  be  given  to  the  Duke  of  Savoy,  to  reconcile  the 
Duke  of  Modena  to  Spain,  the  Duke  of  Parma  to  the  Holy 
See,  and  to  obtain  an  amnesty  for  political  offenses  in  the 
kingdom  of  Naples.  The  Prince  of  Monaco  had  placed 
himself  under  the  protection  of  France,  and  a  French  branch 
of  the  house  of  Gonzaga  had  obtained  Montferrat,  Mantua, 
and  Guastalla.  If,  therefore,  Mazarin  had  not  been  able  to 
drive  the  Spaniards  from  the  peninsula,  nor  to  sign  a  league 
with  the  Italian  princes  similar  to  the  one  which  opened 
Germany  to  him,  he  had  at  least  interfered  in  all  the  affairs 
of  Italy,  and  he  foresaw  that  in  case  of  need  France  would 
find  in  that  country  alliances  and  means  of  action  against 
Spain. 

From  the  re-established  peace  two  princes  obtained  differ- 
ent advantages.  The  military  court  of  the  Duke  of  Savoy, 
Charles  Emmanuel  II.,  was  occupied  with  organizing  a 
strong  army  and  with  making  over  the  Alps  that  beautiful 
road  of  the  Grotto  which  leads  form  Lyons  to  Turin  by  Les 
Echelles.  The  learned  court  of  Ferdinand  II.  in  Tus- 
cany, was  occupied  with  experiments  and  researches  which 
made  Florence  one  of  the  centers  of  science  in  the  seven- 
teenth century.  Toricelli,  the  inventor  of  the  barometer, 
the  disciple  of  Galileo,  had  just  died  (1647);  but  the 
geometrician  Viviani  was  to  receive  there  the  presents  of 
Louis  XIV.,  and  the  celebrated  Academia  del  Cimento  was 
founded. 


324  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

Venice,  in  possession  of  the  northeast  of  the  peninsula 
as  far  as  Cremona,  of  Friuli,  of  part  of  Istria,  of  the  coast 
of  Dalmatia,  of  Corfu  and  Candia,  held  herself  aloof  from 
the  affairs  of  Italy.  Her  interests  were  elsewhere — in  the 
Archipelago,  in  the  Adriatic.  A  war  with  the  Ottomans, 
begun  in  1644,  of  which  the  most  remarkable  event  was  the 
siege  of  Candia,*  gave  Venice  an  opportunity  of  showing 
what  patriotism,  courage,  and  perseverance  she  still  pre- 
served. Genoa  was  no  longer  spoken  of.  As  almost  the 
whole  commerce  of  the  Levant  was  in  the  hands  of  the 
Venetians,  Genoa  attempted  to  monopolize  that  along  the 
shores  of  Spain  and  Africa.  Thus  she  was  closely  bound 
to  Spain.  She  was  soon  to  pay  the  price  by  a  bombardment 
and  humiliation. 

The  Knights  of  St.  John  always  held  Malta  as  a  fief  of  the 
kingdom  of  Naples. 

Since  the  fatal  Thirty  Years'  War,  which  had  covered  her 
with  still  visible  ruins,  Germany  was  powerless.  The 
greater  number  of  the  petty  princes  who  had  substituted 
their  tyranny  for  imperial  authority  wanted  to  maintain  a 
court  and  ambassadors;  and  the  people  were  worn  out  in 
maintaining  the  exaggerated  luxury  of  their  masters.  Poor 
in  spite  of  their  exactions,  these  needy  sovereigns  made 
traffic  of  their  alliances  and  sold  their  armies.  The  treaty 
of  Westphalia  had  assured  their  independence  of  the 
emperor;  the  League  of  the  Rhine  bound  many  of  them  to 
France.  In  1663  the  diet  of  Ratisbon  was  to  become  per- 
petual. This  gave  the  finishing  stroke  to  imperial  authority. 

Austria,  emerging  exhausted  from  the  war,  regained  her 
strength  slowly  and  curbed  her  ambition.  In  1658  Leopold 
I.  had  succeeded  his  father,  Ferdinand  III.  His  reign,  last- 
ing until  1705,  was  without  eclat,  but  on  the  whole  profita- 
ble for  his  house,  thanks  to  able  generals  and  the  assistance 
of  Europe.  This  house  then  divided  into  three  branches: 
that  of  Spain,  ruling  at  Madrid ;  those  of  Tyrol  and  Styria, 
reunited  in  1673. 

*  The  siege  of  the  city  of  Candia  by  the  Ottomans  continued  over 
twenty-four  years,  being  the  longest  siege  recorded  in  history.  The 
Ottomans  made  65  great  assaults  and  45  underground  attacks  ;  they  also 
exploded  more  than  3000  mines  and  the  besieged  1172  counter-mines. 
In  these  various  encounters  over  100,000  Ottomans  and  nearly  50,000 
Venetians  perished.  Candia  was  the  last  Venetian  possession  in  the 
Levant. — ED, 


CHAP.  XX.]  CONDITION  OF  EUROPE  IN  1661.  325 

y 

Another  house  was  growing  up  in  Germany,  the  house  of 
Brandenburg.  In  1618  it  had  acquired  Prussia,  whereby 
it  confronted  the  Russians  at  Koenigsberg,  and  in  1629  the 
duchy  of  Cleves  and  the  counties  of  Mark  and  Ravensberg, 
which  placed  it  at  the  gates  of  France  upon  the  Rhine. 
Frederick  William  was  already  called  the  Great  Elector;  his 
son  was  to  call  himself  King  of  Prussia. 

Switzerland  comprised  thirteen  confederated  cantons, 
several  allied  countries,  as  the  abbey  of  St.  Gall,  the 
bishopric  of  Basel,  the  town  of  Muhlhausen  in  Alsace, 
Valais,  the  Grisons,  and  some  conquered  countries,  as  the 
seven  Italian  bailiwicks  seized  from  the  Milanais  between 
1500  and  1512.  Berne  was  the  most  powerful  of  these 
countries,  possessing  Aargau  and  the  country  of  the  Vaud. 
The  Swiss  had  prudently  renounced  the  belligerent  role 
which  they  had  played  in  the  sixteenth  century,  and  con- 
tented themselves  with  furnishing  several  powers  with 
recruits,  whose  pay  brought  a  little  gold  into  their  poor 
mountain  towns. 

By  her  acquisitions  in  the  Thirty  Years'  War  Sweden 
held  the  mouths  of  three  large  rivers  of  Germany,  the  Weser, 
Elbe,  and  Oder;  she  was  mistress  of  Finland,  and  still 
occupied,  upon  the  southern  shore  of  the  gulf  of  that  name, 
Carelia  and  Ingria,  surrendered  by  the  Russians  in  1647, 
and  Esthonia  and  Livonia,  abandoned  by  the  Poles  in  1635. 
Thus  the  Baltic  was  a  Swedish  sea,  and  the  supremacy  of 
the  north  of  Europe  for  a  long  time  seemed  attached  to  the 
crown  of  Gustavus  Adolphus. 

Christina,  a  daughter  of  the  conqueror  of  Tilly  and 
Wallenstein,  knew  how  to  preserve  this  brilliant  position 
for  her  kingdom;  but  in  1654,  either  through  disinclina- 
tion for  business  or  caprice,  she  abdicated  in  favor  of  her 
cousin,  Charles  Gustavus,  of  the  house  of  Deux-Ponts. 
This  prince,  who  to  a  taste  for  letters  peculiar  to  his  family 
joined  extraordinary  courage  and  ambition,  was  at  first 
occupied  in  defending  himself  against  the  pretensions  of 
the  King  of  Poland,  John  Casimir.  The  Swedes  had  every- 
where the  advantage  and  captured  Warsaw.  John  Casimir 
had  fled  to  Silesia;  but  the  Poles  rose  in  arms  and  55,000 
advanced  to  recapture  their  capital.  The  action  took  place 
under  the  walls  of  the  city  (1656).  After  three  days  of 
stubborn  effort,  and  in  spite  of  the  heroic  courage  of  the 
Poles,  Charles  Gustavus,  who  had  only  24,000  men,  won 


326  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

such  a  complete  victory  that  to  save  Poland  a  coalition  of 
all  the  neighboring  powers  was  necessary.  The  emperor, 
the  King  of  Denmark,  and  the  Elector  of  Brandenburg 
united;  the  Swedes  were  forced  to  abandon  their  conquest. 
But  Charles  Gustavus  revenged  himself  upon  Denmark:  he 
crossed  the  straits  upon  the  ice,  terrified  Copenhagen,  and 
by  the  treaty  of  Roskild  obtained  the  provinces  of  Halland, 
Scania,  Blekinge,  and  Bohus,  exacted  the  free  passage  of 
the  Sound  for  Swedish  vessels,  and  the  independence  of 
Holstein-Gottorp  (1658). 

The  peace  lasted  hardly  a  few  months;  emboldened  by 
his  first  successes,  the  King  of  Sweden  aspired  to  the  con- 
quest of  Denmark,  and  again  laid  siege  to  Copenhagen. 
But  the  town  resisted;  the  Dutch  dispatched  a  fleet  into  the 
Sound;  Austria,  Poland,  and  Brandenburg  sent  an  army 
into  Denmark.  The  Swedes,  menaced  on  every  side,  gave 
up  the  siege,  and  after  the  sudden  death  of  Charles  Gus- 
tavus, peace  was  re-established  between  Denmark  and 
Sweden  by  the  treaty  of  Copenhagen,  which  confirmed  that 
of  Roskild,  between  Poland  and  Sweden  by  the  treaty  of 
Oliva  (1660),  between  Sweden  and  Russia  by  the  treaty  of 
Kardis  (1661).  Upon  the  whole,  Sweden  came  out  honor- 
ably from  the  unequal  struggle  she  had  just  sustained.  She 
regained  her  natural  boundaries  on  the  south  by  the 
acquisition  of  Blekinge,  Halland,  and  Scania;  her  natural 
boundaries  on  the  coast  of  Norway,  which  belonged  to  Den- 
mark, by  the  acquisition  of  Bohus,  Jemtland,  and  Heridalia. 
She  obtained  Lithuanian  Livonia  from  Poland,  and  pre- 
served Ingria  with  a  large  part  of  Carelia,  captured  from 
the  Russian  Empire,  so  that  all  the  shores  of  the  Gulf  of 
Finland  were  her  possession.  But  these  continual  wars 
weighed  heavily  upon  a  poor  people,  few  in  number,  and 
upon  a  country  almost  entirely  devoid  of  agriculture  and 
industry,  and  Sweden  was  unable  to  keep  the  scepter  of  the 
North  which  she  had  seized. 

In  the  midst  of  these  military  events  a  revolution  occurred 
of  which  the  consequences  have  been  modified  only  in  our 
day.  The  aristocracy  in  Denmark  was  paramount;  King 
Ferdinand  III.,  supported  by  the  clergy  and  the  citizens, 
shattered  its  power  in  1660  and  proclaimed  the  heredity 
of  the  crown.  The  new  law  then  promised  was  not  pro- 
claimed until  1709,  under  the  name  of  the  royal  law;  but  it 
existed  in  reality  from  1660.  It  established  the  most  com- 


CHAP.  XX.]          CONDITION  OF  EUROPE  IN  1661.  327 

plete  absolutism,  and  it  endured  until  1834.  Unfortunately 
the  first  of  the  hereditary  kings  was  a  German.  He  gave 
over  the  entire  administration  to  his  compatriots,  so  that 
German  became  the  official  language  of  the  Danish  terri- 
tory. Denmark  is  to-day  struggling  against  this  influence. 

Poland, which  had  formerly  held  the  first  rank  in  the  North, 
had  descended  to  the  second,  and  was  very  near  falling  to 
the  third.  Her  territory  still  extended  from  the  Carpathian 
Mountains  to  the  Baltic,  and  from  the  Oder  to  the  sources 
of  the  Dnieper  and  Volga,  but  her  anarchical  constitution 
and  her  elective  royalty  were  already  exposing  her  with- 
out defense  to  foreign  wars.  What  the  Swedes  had  just 
effected  under  Charles  Gustavus  the  Russians  were  speed- 
ily to  accomplish.  The  latter,  whom  the  Swedes,  the 
Poles,  and  the  Duke  of  Courland  and  Semigalle  shut  off 
from  the  Baltic,  were  separated  from  the  Black  Sea  by  the 
warlike  republic  of  the  Cossacks,  intractable  subjects  of 
Poland,  and  by  Tartar  hordes.  They  had  no  possibility  of 
free  extension  save  toward  the  desert  regions  of  Siberia; 
the  fall  of  the  powerful  republic  of  Novgorod  in  1476 
under  Ivan  III.  had  opened  the  approaches  of  the  Baltic 
and  of  the  Arctic  Ocean;  finally,  by  the  destruction  of  the 
Tartars  of  Astrakhan  (1554)  they  had  arrived  a  century 
before  upon  the  Caspian.  The  treaty  of  Andrussow  (1667), 
which  deprived  Poland  of  Smolensk,  Tchernigow,  and  the 
Ukraine,  was  Russia's  first  step  toward  the  west.  The 
dynasty  of  the  Romanoffs,  founded  by  Michael  Feodoro- 
vitch,  reigned  after  1613  and  became  extinct  in  1762. 

Russia,  however,  already  possessed  formidable  elements 
of  power.  In  the  latter  half  of  the  fifteenth  century  Ivan 
III.  had  abolished  in  his  family  the  law  of  appanage;  thereby 
he  established  the  unity  of  government  and  of  the  state;  but 
this  same  law  he  had,  on  the  other  hand,  maintained  for 
the  nobles,  whereby  they  were  divided  and  weakened.  A 
century  afterward  Ivan  IV.  had  spent  fifteen  years  in  ren- 
dering his  boyars  supple  to  the  yoke,  and  had  shown  that 
implacable  cruelty  which,  even  among  that  people  accus- 
tomed to  disregard  life,  won  him  the  name  of  the  Terrible. 
Finally,  a  ukase  of  1592  had  reduced  all  the  peasants  to  the 
servitude  of  the  soil,  prohibiting  them  from  a  change  of 
master  or  locality. 

The  Ottomans  had  lost  the  religious  and  military  enthu- 
siasm of  the  preceding  age,  but  they  still  held  the  first  rank 


328  THE  A  SCENDENC  Y  OF  FRA  NCE. 

in  oriental  Europe.  The  Prince  of  Transylvania  was  their 
vassal;  the  ban  at  of  Temeswar  and  a  considerable  part  of 
Hungary  were  in  their  hands;  the  Dniester  separated  them 
from  Poland,  and  all  the  coast  of  the  Black  Sea  as  far 
as  Kouban  belonged  to  them.  In  Asia  their  domains 
extended  from  Erivan  to  Bagdad.  Venice  struggled  pain- 
fully against  them.  In  1660  they  captured  Mitylene  and 
Lemnos,  and  the  same  year  they  defeated  the  Austrians  in 
Hungary.  In  1663  the  latter  saw  Neuhoesel  fall  at  the 
gates  of  Pressburg,  and  Vienna  found  herself  once  more 
unprotected  and  menaced.  Louis  XIV.  preluded  his  con- 
quests by  ostentatiously  sending  assistance  to  the  Austrians 
for  the  battle  of  St.  Gothard  (1664),  and  to  Venice  for  the 
siege  of  Candia  (1667). 


CHAPTER  XXI. 

THE    REIGN    OF    LOUIS    XIV.    TO    THE   WAR    OF    THE 
LEAGUE   OF  AUGSBURG. 


Administrative  Centralization  of  ¥  ranee  ;  Colbert  and  Louvois. — War  in 
Flanders  (1667). — First  Coalition  against  France  (1668). — War  with 
Holland  (1672). — Conquests  by  Louis  XIV.  in  Time  of  Peace. — 
Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes  (1685). 


AFTER  the   death  of  Mazarin    Louis  XIV.   resolved  to 

dispense  with  a  prime  minister.     In  this  he  persisted  until 

.  .  .  the  end  of  his  life,  working  eight  hours  a  day 

Admimstra-  ,  .  '  .  °       °       .  •> 

tive  centraiiza-  and  allowing  no  important  business  to  be 
88*rtPrmiJSd  decided  without  him.  Few  sovereigns  have 
Louvois.  better  understood  and  practiced  what  he 

called  the  "trade  of  a  king."  "One  reigns  by  work,"  he 
wrote  in  his  instructions  to  his  son,  "one  reigns  for  work;  it 
is  ingratitude  and  audacity  toward  God,  injustice  and 
tyranny  toward  men,  to  desire  the  one  without  the  other." 
What  is  more  remarkable  still,  this  young  prince,  who 
grasped  the  reins  so  boldly,  had  already  conceived  the 
whole  plan  of  his  policy.  Not  only  did  Louis  XIV.  reign 
with  unlimited  power,  but  he  was  the  first  to  establish  in 
France  the  theory  of  absolute  monarchy.  In  his  estimation 
royalty  was  a  divine  institution;  sovereigns  were  the  repre- 
sentatives of  God  upon  earth,  his  lieutenants,  providen- 
tially inspired  by  him,  and  by  virtue  of  this  sharing  in 
some  degree  his  power  and  infallibility.  Thus  in  the  pres- 
ence of  royalty  he  allowed  no  liberty  to  exist  which  could 
cause  it  umbrage.  The  greater  part  of  the  provinces  had 
their  own  States  or  Chambers;  these  he  suppressed.  Those 
which  were  preserved,  as  in  Languedoc,  Burgundy,  Prov- 
ence, and  Brittany,  met  only  to  execute  the  orders  which 
they  received  from  the  ministers.  The  remnant  of  munic- 
ipal and  provincial  liberties  was  destroyed;  the  king,  coin- 


330  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

ing  money  from  the  ancient  rights  dear  to  the  towns,  con- 
verted the  mayoralties  into  hereditary  offices  and  sold  them 
to  the  highest  bidder. 

Municipal  life  was  therefore  suspended  in  the  country  as 
political  life  had  been  long  before — a  grievous  situation,  for 
France  lacked  a  practical  business  education;  when  a  cen- 
tury later  she  was  forced  to  take  the  government  of  herself 
from  the  faltering  hands  of  absolute  royalty  she  found 
many  bold  and  powerful  logicians  to  guide  her,  but  no 
experienced  men  who  understood  how  to  adjust  the  future 
to  the  past.  To  be  stable  political  liberty  must  stand  upon 
the  broad  basis  of  municipal  liberties.  .  Thus  it  has  grown 
and  been  maintained  in  England.* 

The  parliaments  were  Only  courts  of  justice  ;  the  nobility 
only  a  military  class  destined  to  shed  its  blood  upon  all 
battlefields,  or  to  follow  in  the  festivals  the  triumphal  car 
of  majesty.  The  clergy  itself  became  more  monarchical, 
and  never  was  an  embarrassment  to  Louis.  As  for  the  third 
estate,  it  was  easily  held  in  check  by  the  army,  the  police, 
the  extreme  severity  of  the  laws  ;  by  the  respect  also  which, 
after  so  many  centuries  of  feudal  oppression,  it  accorded  to 
a  power  which  gave  it  internal  peace  and  also  called  it  into 
numerous  departments  of  public  administration. 

Thus  the  dominating  trait  of  the  government  of  Louis 
XIV.  was  an  immense  effort  to  bring  back  into  the  hands  of 
the  prince  all  the  forces  of  the  country,  doubtless  to  dispose 
of  them  in  the  interest  of  the  country,  but  more  especially 
for  the  interest  of  the  king.  Hence  that  excessive  central- 
ization which  enveloped  the  commerce,  the  industry,  the 
political  life,  even  the  moral  life  of  France;  and  the  thou- 
sand bonds  of  a  minute  regulation,  so  that  the  initiative  of 
the  ministers  was  almost  universally  substituted  for  individual 
and  communal  action.  As  the  result  of  this  system  France 
lived  less  by  her  own  life  than  by  the  life  of  her  govern- 
ment. When  age  and  disease  caused  that  omnipresent 
hand  of  power  to  grow  cold  everything  declined.  A  great 
people  was  subjected  to  the  vicissitudes  of  one  man's  exist- 
ence, to  the  hazard  of  royal  birth,  or  to  the  choice  of 

*  The  free  institutions  and  constitutional  government  of  England  have 
nowhere  been  more  appreciated  than  in  France.  To  enumerate  all  the 
writers  who  have  expressed  themselves  in  terms  of  admiration,  often 
bordering  upon  envy,  would  be  to  give  the  almost  complete  list  of 
French  thinkers. — ED. 


CHAP.  XXL]  THE  REIGN  OF  LOUIS  XIV.  331 

incapable  ministers.  However,  during  happy  years  this 
administration,  which  made  itself  the  universal  guardian, 
restored  to  the  people  in-  well-being  and  security  an  equiva- 
lent of  what  they  lost  in  general  and  individual  liberty. 
The  king  himself,  as  we  have  already  seen,  understood  the 
obligations  imposed  upon  him  by  this  immense  authority. 
"We  should  consider  the  welfare  of  our  subjects  rather  than 
our  own  good,"  he  said.  "And  this  authority  which  we 
possess  over  them  should  serve  us  only  to  work  more  effect- 
ively for  their  happiness."  If  he  loaded  his  ministers  with 
honors,  riches,  and  power,  it  was  on  condition  that  they 
consecrated  every  moment  of  their  life  to  public  affairs. 
From  this  long-sustained  effort  resulted  the  most  active, 
the  most  vigilant,  administration  that  France  had  yet  pos- 
sessed. Its  history  is  almost  entirely  summed  up  in  the 
history  of  two  great  ministers,  Colbert  and  Louvois. 

Colbert  directed  what  would  be  five  ministries  to-day:  the 
finances,  intrusted  to  him  at  the  fall  of  Fouquet,  the  king's 
household  together  with  the  fine  arts,  agriculture  including 
commerce,  public  works,  and  from  1669  the  marine,  an 
overwhelming  weight,  under  which  he  did  not  succumb. 
The  finances  had  again  fallen  into  the  chaos  from  which  Sully 
had  rescued  them.  The  public  debt  was  about  430,000,000 
francs,  the  revenues  were  devoured  two  years  in  advance, 
and  the  treasury  out  of  annual  taxes  of  84,000,000  re- 
ceived scarcely  32,000,000.  Colbert  began  by  establishing  a 
chamber  of  justice  for  the  discovery  of  the  malversations  of 
the  officers  of  finance.  The  farmers  of  the  revenue  who  had 
profited  by  state  necessities  to  lend  upon  usury  were  com- 
pelled to  make  restitution ;  the  fines  amounted  to  1 10,000,000. 

Colbert  was  the  real  creator  of  the  budget.  Before  his 
time  expenditures  were  made  at  random  without  consulting 
the  treasury  receipts.  He  was  the  first  to  draw  up  each  year 
an  estimate,  divided  under  two  heads,  in  which  the  revenues 
and  the  probable  expenses  were  indicated  in  advance. 

The  taille,  or  land  tax,  was  paid  only  by  the  burgesses  and 
the  people;  in  1661  it  amounted  to  52,500,000.  Colbert 
lowered  it  by  successive  reductions  to  32,500,000.  In  the 
midst  of  the  troubles  of  the  Fronde  many  people  had 
ennobled  themselves  by  their  own  authority,  or  had  bought 
titles  of  nobility  for  a  few  crowns;  thereby  the  privileged 
classes  were  doubled.  A  royal  ordinance  revoked  all  the 
patents  of  nobility  granted  during  the  last  thirty  years ;  about 


33 2  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

40,000  families,  the  richest  residents  of  the  parishes,  were 
again  submitted  to  the  impost,  so  the  imposts  of  their  neigh- 
bors were  reduced. 

The  comptroller  general  with  good  reason  preferred  the 
aides,  or  indirect  taxes,  to  which  all  contributed,  to  the 
villain  tax.  He  augmented  or  created  taxes  upon  coffee, 
tobacco,  wine,  cards,  lotteries,  and  the  like;  and  from 
1,500,000  francs  raised  them  to  21,000,000. 

The  summary  of  the  financial  adminstration  of  Colbert 
is  as  follows:  In  1661  out  of  85,000,000  in  taxes  the 
treasury  had  to  pay  52,500,000  in  pensions  and  salaries; 
there  remained  only  32,500,000,  and  the  expenditure  was 
60,000,000 — deficit  27,500,000.  In  1^83,  the  year  of  Col- 
bert's death,  the  imposts  brought  in  112,500,000,  notwith- 
standing a  reduction  of  22,500,000  upon  the  villain  tax; 
of  this  salaries  and  pensions  required  only  22,500,000;  the 
net  revenue  of  the  treasury  was  90,000,000.  Thus,  on  the 
one  side,  Colbert  had  augmented  the  receipts  27,500,000, 
and  diminished  the  pensions  and  salaries  30,000,000,  which 
constituted  a  net  annual  benefit  to  the  state  of  57,500,000; 
and,  on  the  other  hand,  he  had  freed  the  lower  classes 
from  22,500,000  by  diminishing  the  villain  tax.  There  is 
nothing  to  add  to  such  figures. 

Colbert  did  not  sacrifice  agriculture  to  manufactures,  as 
was  often  said.  He  exempted  numerous  families  from  the 
villain  tax;  he  interdicted  the  seizure  of  tools  and  of  cattle 
in  payment  of  taxes  due  to  the  state ;  he  established,  or 
rather  re-established,  studs,  where  French  horses  were 
crossed  with  those  of  Africa  and  Denmark;  cattle  were 
brought  from  Germany  and  Switzerland  to  improve  those  of 
France;  he  granted  bounties  to  the  best  breeders;  he 
prdered  the  drainage  of  the  marshes;  finally,  he  published 
a  code  of  water  and  forest  laws  (1669)  which  is  still  for  the 
most  part  in  force  to-day.  But  he  committed  the  blunder 
of  respecting  the  popular  prejudice  which  saw  in  the  free- 
dom of  the  corn  trade  a  cause  of  scarcity. 

In  spite  of  the  efforts  of  Henry  IV.  manufactures  were 
still  in  their  infancy,  and  the  French  obtained  almost  every- 
thing from  foreign  countries.  Colbert,  born  in  the  shop  of 
a  merchant  at  Rheims,  under  the  sign  of  the  Long  Cloak, 
wanted  France  to  produce  for  herself;  he  imposed  heavy 
duties,  on  their  entrance  into  the  kingdom,  upon  products 
from  foreign  countries  (tariff  of  1667). 


CHAP.  XXI.]  THE  REIGN  OF  LOUIS  XIV.  333 

This  was  the  inauguration  of  the  protective  system,  a 
system  useful  to  an  infant  industry,  but  injurious  after  it  is 
developed.  He  spared  no  pains  in  purchasing  or  penetrat- 
ing the  industrial  secrets  of  neighboring  nations,  and  in 
attracting  the  most  skillful  workmen  to  France;  this  was 
good  policy  both  then  and  now.  The  number  of  manu- 
factures rapidly  increased.  He  maintained  them  by  sub- 
sidies intelligently  awarded,  advancing  a  certain  sum  to  each 
trade  in  addition  to  considerable  donations  to  masters  and 
workmen.  He  obtained  from  the  Church  the  abolition 
of  seventeen  holidays,  and  thereby  diminished  useless  inter- 
ruptions of  labor.  Finally,  he  instituted  councils  of  arbitra- 
tors to  settle  disputes  in  the  working  world.  In  1669  for 
wool  alone  there  were  44,200  looms  and  more  than  60,000 
workmen.  The  woolen  factories  of  Sedan,  Louviers, 
Elbeuf,  and  Abbeville  had  no  rivals  in  Europe;  tin,  steel, 
crockery,  morocco,  which  had  always  been  brought  from  a 
distance,  were  worked  in  France;  Persian  and  Turkish 
carpets  were  excelled  at  La  Savonnerie;  rich  stuffs,  in  which 
silk  is  interwoven  with  gold  and  silver,  were  made  at  Lyons 
and  Tours;  finer  mirrors  were  manufactured  at  Tourlaville 
near  Cherburg  and  at  Paris  than  in  Venice;  the  tapestries 
of  Flanders  were  surpassed  by  those  of  the  Gobelins. 

Colbert  could  not  remove  the  numerous  tolls  established 
upon  the  roads  and  rivers;  he  reduced  them,  however,  and 
in  twelve  provinces  suppressed  the  internal  customs  duties. 
By  diminishing  the  export  dues  (1664)  he  encouraged  the 
exportation  of  wines  and  brandies.  He  declared  Dunkirk, 
Bayonne,  and  Marseilles  free  ports,  and  granted  to  the  last 
of  these  towns  in  1660  a  marine  insurance  company;  he 
created  markets,  favored  the  transport  of  foreign  merchan- 
dise through  France,  caused  the  highways  which  had  become 
impassable  to  be  repaired,  and  constructed  new  ones. 
Finally  he  formed  a  plan  for  a  canal  in  Burgundy,  decreed 
the  construction  of  one  at  Orleans,  which  was  opened  in 
1692,  and  deepened  the  one  at  Languedoc,  which  was  to 
connect  the  Mediterranean  and  the  ocean.  The  port  of 
Cette  was  constructed  at  one  of  its  extremities,  Toulouse 
was  at  the  other;  and  from  Toulouse  the  Garonne  led  easily 
to  Bordeaux  and  the  ocean.  This  work,  gigantic  for  that 
period,  was  begun  in  1664  and  continued  without  interrup- 
tion until  1681.  It  was  executed  by  the  celebrated  Riquet, 
descendant  of  an  ancient  Florentine  family,  upon  the  designs 


334  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

of  Andreossi,  a  French  engineer;  it  cost  about  7,000,000 
francs,  and  employed  annually  10,000  to  12,000  workmen. 

Commerce  thus  encouraged  developed  rapidly.  For  the 
regulation  and  advancement  of  this  new  activity  a  board  of 
trade  was  instituted  in  1665,  and  Louis  XIV.  presided  over 
it  nearly  every  fortnight.  Similar  boards  were  established 
in  the  provinces;  t.iey  were  to  choose  from  their  number 
the  three  most  experienced  merchants  to  appear  at  court, 
"in  order  to  inform  the  king  and  M.  de  Colbert  what  it 
would  be  expedient  to  do."  An  ordinance  of  1671,  which 
unfortunately  was  not  executed,  prescribed  uniform  weights 
and  measures  for  all  the  ports  and  arsenals  of  France. 

Foreigners  had  made  themselves  masters  of  all  French 
commerce  by  sea;  each  year  4000  Dutch  vessels  discharged 
upon  the  French  shores  the  products  of  their  industry  with 
the  merchandise  of  the  two  worlds,  and  carried  away  French 
silks,  wines,  and  brandies  for  transportation  to  Europe  and 
to  distant  countries.  Colbert  wished  to  raise  France  from 
this  inferiority.  Already  in  1658  the  superintendent  Fou- 
quet  had  established  an  anchorage  tax  of  'fifty  sous  per 
ton  upon  foreign  vessels,  payable  at  entrance  and  departure 
from  French  ports;  Colbert  retained  this  duty;  moreover, 
he  granted  to  French  vessels  export  and  import  bounties, 
and  to  builders  of  ships  designed  for  distant  commerce 
another  bounty  of  from  7^  to  12^  francs  per  ton;  he  estab- 
lished five  large  companies  after  the  model  of  the  Dutch  and 
English  companies:  those  of  the  East  and  West  Indies  in 
1664;  those  of  the  North  and  the  Levant  in  1666;  that  of 
the  Senegal  in  1673;  granted  them  the  exclusive  monopoly 
of  the  commerce  in  these  remote  regions,  made  then  con- 
siderable advances  (6,000,000  francs  for  the  East  India 
Company  alone),  and  obliged  the  princes  of  the  blood,  the 
lords,  and  the  wealthy  to  take  shares  in  them;  finally,  an 
edict  of  1669  declared  that  to  engage  in  sea  commerce  was 
not  unbecoming  to  the  nobility. 

France  possessed  only  Canada  with  Acadia,  or  Nova 
Scotia,  Cayenne  in  Guiana,  the  island  of  Bourbon,  a  few 
factories  in  Madagascar  and  the  Indies.  Colbert  purchased 
for  less  than  a  million  Martinique,  Guadaloupe,  St.  Lucia, 
Grenada,  and  the  Grenadilles,  Marie  Galante,  St.  Martin, 
St.  Christopher,  St.  Bartholomew,  St.  Croix,  and  La  Tortue 
in  the  Lesser  Antilles  (1664);  he  placed  under  French  pro- 
tection the  French  freebooters  of  St.  Domingo,  who  had 


CHAP.  XXL]  THE  REIGN  OF  LOUIS  XIV.  335 

taken  possession  of  the  western  part  of  the  island  (1664); 
he  sent  new  colonists  to  Cayenne  and  Canada,  seized  New- 
foundland to  command  the  entrance  of  the  St.  Lawrence, 
and  commenced  the  occupation  of  the  magnificent  valley  of 
the  Mississippi,  or  Louisiana,  which  had  just  been  explored 
by  the  celebrated  traveler  Robert  de  la  Salle  (1680).  In 
Africa  he  captured  Goree  from  the  Dutch  (1665),  and  took 
possession  of  the  eastern  shores  of  Madagascar.  In  Asia 
the  India  Company  was  established  at  Surat,  at  Chanderna- 
gor,  and  later  at  Pondicherry.  Finally,  to  reserve  all  the 
commerce  of  French  colonies  for  the  national  flag,  Colbert 
closed  their  ports  to  foreign  vessels. 

Mazarin  had  allowed  the  military  marine  created  by 
Richelieu  ;o  decline.  Colbert  first  caused  the  few  vessels 
still  in  the  French  harbors  to  be  repaired;  he  purchased 
others  in  Sweden  and  Holland ;  shipyards  were  established 
at  Dunkirk,  Havre,  and  Rochefort,  which  was  built  upon 
the  Charente  commanding  the  Gulf  of  Gascony.  Henry 
IV.  had  founded  Toulon  and  Richelieu  Brest;  but  they  had 
not  so  much  made  them  great  harbors  as  shown  what  could 
be  done  there.  After  1665  Duquesne  remained  seven  years 
at  Brest,  and  when  Seignelay,  the  son  of  Colbert,  went  there 
in  1672  he  saw  a  fleet  of  50  vessels  of  the  line.  In  1683 
Vauban  surrounded  it  with  formidable  defenses.  After  the 
peace  of  Nimeguen  he  also  executed  immense  works  at 
Toulon,  which  made  that  town  what  nature  intended  it 
should  be,  one  of  the  finest  ports  in  the  world.  The  new 
flrating  dock  that  he  constructed  could  itself  contain  100 
ships  of  the  line. 

To  recruit  the  fleet  Colbert  created  the  maritime  registry, 
or  system  of  classification,  which  the  French  still  preserve, 
and  which  compels  the  maritime  population  of  the  coast,  in 
return  for  certain  privileges,  to  furnish  the  recruits  neces- 
sary for  the  crews.  These  recruits  according  to  their  age 
and  the  position  of  their  family  are  divided  into  different 
classes,  which  are  successively  summoned  according  to  the 
needs  of  the  service.  This  institution,  to-day  less  beneficial 
than  then,  was  completed  by  the  founding  of  a  pension 
fund,  which  assured  on  their  retirement  a  pension  to  vet- 
eran seamen.  The  first  census  in  1670  registered  36,000 
sailors,  but  in  1683  tne  number  was  77,852.  Armaments 
could  then  be  multiplied.  In  1661  the  war  fleet  consisted 
of  only  39  ships;  in  1678  it  comprised  120,  and  five  years 


336  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

later,  176.  In  1692  the  king  had  131  ships,  133  frigates, 
and  101  other  vessels.  The  corps  of  the  marine  guards, 
composed  of  1000  noblemen,  was  instituted  in  1672  to  train 
good  officers,  as  was  also  a  school  of  gunners  to  form  skillful 
artillerymen,  and  a  school  of  hydrography  to  furnish  ships 
with  exact  charts. 

In  a  memorandum  submitted  to  the  king  May  15,  1665, 
Colbert  had  asked  that  legislation  be  remodeled  so  that 
there  should  be  in  France  only  one  system  of  laws,  and  of 
weights  and  measures.  He  moreover  asked  that  justice 
should  be  free,  that  the  sale  of  offices  should  be  abolished, 
the  value  of  which  was  estimated  at  800,000,000  francs,  that 
the  number  of  monks  be  diminished,  and  the  useful  profes- 
sions encouraged.  A  commission  was  in  fact  appointed. 
It  was  composed  of  counselors  of  state  and  masters  of 
petitions,*  such  as  Voisin,  d'Aligre,  Boucherat,  and  Pussort, 
who  after  the  completion  of  the  work  discussed  it  with  the 
eminent  members  of  Parliament  in  the  presence  of  the 
ministers  and  under  the  presidency  of  the  chancellor, 
sometimes  even  under  that  of  the  king.  Six  codes  were 
the  result  of  these  deliberations:  in  1667  the  Civil  Ordi- 
nance, which  abolished  some  of  the  iniquitous  practices 
of  the  Middle  Ages,  diminished  the  delays  of  justice,  and 
regulated  the  form  of  the  registers  of  the  civil  status;  in 
1669  that  of  the  Waters  and  Forests;  in  1670  the  Ordinance 
of  Criminal  Instruction,  which  restricted  the  use  of  the  rack 
and  various  cases  of  provisory  imprisonment,  but  which 
permitted  neither  counsel  nor  witness  to  one  accused  of  a 
capital  crime,  maintained  the  atrocious  old-time  punish- 
ments, as  the  wheel  and  quartering,  and  always  meted  out 
a  punishment  disproportionate  to  the  offense;  in  1673  the 
Commercial  Code,  a  true  title  of  glory  for  Colbert;  in  1681 
the  Marine  and  Colonial  Code,  which  has  formed  the  com- 
mon law  of  European  nations  and  serves  them  even  to-day  as 
basis  of  maritime  law;  in  1685  the  Black  Code,  which  regu- 

*  The  French  term  "  maitres  des  requetes,"  rendered  "masters  of 
petitions,"  like  many  others  denoting  feudal  and  mediaeval  offices,  has  no 
exactly  corresponding  term  in  English.  Especially  difficult  is  it,  save  with 
long  circumlocution,  to  indicate  the  judicial  magistrates,  their  duties  and 
even  the  names  of  the  numerous  courts.  Moreover,  function  and  juris- 
diction varied  greatly  during  the  centuries.  Under  Louis  the  maitres 
des  requetes  sat  by  alternating  periods  of  three  months  in  the  state  council 
and  in  the  Royal  Court  of  Judicature.  In  the  former  case  they  had  no 
vote,  but  could  plead  or  advise  ;  in  the  latter  they  pronounced  decrees 
from  which  appeal  might  be  made  to  Parliament. — ED. 


CHAP.  XXI.]  THE  REIGN  OF  LOUIS  XIV.  337 

lated  the  condition  of  the  negroes  in  the  French  colonies. 
These  ordinances  constitute  the  greatest  work  of  codifica- 
tion which  has  been  executed  from  Justinian  to  Napoleon. 
Portions  of  them  are  still  in  force;  the  ordinance  concerning 
the  marine  composes  almost  all  the  second  book  of  the 
present  French  commercial  code.  To  superintend  the  care- 
ful execution  of  these  laws  masters  of  petitions  were  several 
times  sent,  like  the  inquisitors  of  St.  Louis,  through  the 
provinces  to  the  parliaments. 

This  same  minister  who  reformed  the  finances,  commerce, 
and  legislation  also  found  time  to  encourage  arts  and 
letters;  in  1663  he  founded  the  Academy  of  Inscriptions 
and  Belles-Lettres;  in  1666  that  of  Sciences,  which  gave 
to  scientific  researches  a  center  and  a  home,  which  they  had 
lacked  previously.  The  Academy  of  Music  was  organized 
the  same  year,  that  of  Architecture  in  1671.  A  school  of 
fine  arts,  established  at  Rome  (1667),  received  scholars 
who  had  won  prizes  at  the  Academy  of  Painting  in  Paris. 
The  Cabinet  of  Medals  and  the  School  of  Languages  for  the 
study  of  Oriental  tongues  were  founded,  the  Royal  Library 
enriched  by  more  than  10,000  volumes  and  by  a  large 
number  of  precious  manuscripts,  the  Mazarin  Library 
opened  to  the  public,  and  the  Zoological  Garden  enlarged. 

Louis  sought  talent  even  abroad:  foreigners  had  a  share 
in  his  liberalities.  "Although  the  king  is  not  your  sover- 
eign," wrote  Colbert,  "he  wishes  to  be  your  benefactor; 
he  commands  me  to  send  you  the  accompanying  bill  of  ex- 
change as  a  pledge  of  his  esteem."  Among  them  were  the 
learned  librarian  of  the  Vatican,  Allaci;  Count  Graziani  at 
Modena,  author  of  the  best  Italian  tragedy  prior  to  the  "Me- 
rope"  of  Maffei;  Vossius,  historiographer  of  the  United 
Provinces;  the  Danish  astronomer  Roemer,  who  was  the 
first  to  calculate  the  velocity  of  solar  light;  the  Dutch 
astronomer  Huyghens,  whom  Colbert  invited  to  Paris  as  he 
did  Roemer,  and  who  remained  there  fifteen  years;  Viviani,  a 
celebrated  Florentine  mathematician,  who  had  a  house  built 
with  this  inscription  in  letters  of  gold:  "^Edes  a  Deo  datse." 

The  competitor  and  rival  of  Colbert,  Francois  Michel  le 
Tellier,  Marquis  of  Louvois,  born  in  1641,  at  the  age  of  fif- 
teen had  entered  the  offices  of  his  father,  Michel  le  Tellier,  the 
Secretary  of  State,  and  he  had  been  initiated  by  a  long  appren- 
ticeship into  the  science  of  military  administration,  where  he 
displayed  an  activity  equal  to  that  of  Colbert.  When  Louis 
XIV.  decided  to  govern  alone  Louvois  really  became  Min- 


338  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BouK  V. 

ister  of  War,  although  he  succeeded  le  Tellier  only  in  1666. 
He  reformed  the  army,  and  his  reforms  endured  as  long 
as  the  old  monarchy.  If  he  preserved  the  system  of  vol- 
untary enlistment,  practiced  through  three  centuries,  he 
diminished  its  abuses  and  dangers  by  more  exact  discipline 
and  severe  regulations.  He  established  the  uniform  by 
ordering  that  each  regiment  should  be  distinguished  by  the 
color  of  the  coat  and  by  different  insignia  (1670);  he 
introduced  the  custom  of  marching  in  step;  he  substituted 
guns  and  bayonets  for  the  pikes  then  in  use;  but  it  was  only 
after  him  that  Vauban  succeeded  in  using  the  musket  both 
as  a  firearm  and  fencing  weapon.  He  introduced  the  use 
of  copper  pontoons  for  crossing  rivers;  he  instituted  store 
and  provision  magazines,  barracks,  military  hospitals,  the 
Hotel  des  Invalides,  all  those  things  almost  unknown  before 
his  time.  He  created  the  corps  of  engineers,  whence  came 
the  great  Vauban 's  best  scholars;  schools  of  artillery  at 
Douai,  Metz,  and  Strasburg;  companies  of  grenadiers  in  the 
infantry;  regiments  of  hussars;  finally,  companies  of  cadets, 
a  sort  of  military  school  for  gentlemen.  He  revolutionized 
the  army  by  introducing  a  regular  order  of  promotion  and  a 
service  of  inspection.  He  did  not  abolish  the  traffic  in  the 
offices,  which  was  also  introduced  into  the  regiments  and 
which  was  of  profit  only  to  the  nobles;  but  to  obtain  ad- 
vancement it  no  longer  sufficed  the  nobles  to  have  ances- 
tors, they  must  have  served;  the  grades  beginning  with  that 
of  colonel  became  the  prize  of  seniority;  a  reform  excel- 
lent then,  but  which  would  be  less  so  to-day.  It  was  only 
after  his  death  that  the  order  of  St.  Louis  was  instituted 
(1693),  designed  to  reward  military  service  with  honor,  this 
time  without  distinction  of  birth,  but  not  without  distinc- 
tion of  religion,  the  Reformers  being  excluded.  By  such 
efforts  France  could  put  in  the  field  in  the  war  in  Flanders 
125,000  men;  in  that  of  Holland,  170,000;  before  Ryswick, 
300,000;  during  the  war  of  the  succession,  450,000. 

We  have  seen  that  in  1651,  when  Louis  XIV.  began  to 

govern  alone,  there  was  neither  king  nor  people  who  could 

equal  him  or  France.     The  first  acts  of  his 

War  in   Flan-       T-     .  .  .     ,         , 

ders  (1667).  First  foreign  policy  revealed  a  desire  for  greatness, 
F°?SS«"fS8S!  a  consciousness  of  his  dignity,  a  haughtiness 
war  with  Hoi-  which  astonished,  but  which  success  justified. 

land  (1672).  T  f      j  •  i  * 

In  consequence  of  a  dispute  about  precedence 
the  court  of  Madrid  was  compelled  to  bid  its  ambassadors 


CHAP.  XXI.]  THE  REIGN  OF  LOUIS  XIV.  339 

take  place  after  the  French  ambassadors  (1662).  The 
Duke  of  Crequi,  envoy  of  the  king  to  the  Pope,  was  in- 
sulted by  the  Corsican  guard;  Louis  exacted  a  remarkable 
reparation  (1664).  The  corsairs  of  Algiers  and  Tunis  dis- 
turbed the  growing  commerce  of  France;  the  Duke  of 
Beaufort  chastised  them,  and  they  set  at  liberty  their  Chris- 
tian captives  (1665).  Portugal  implored  the  assistance 
of  France  against  the  Spaniards;  4000  veteran  soldiers 
under  Marshal  Schomberg  by  the  victory  of  Villaviciosa 
established  the  house  of  Braganza  upon  the  throne  (1665). 
Louis  also  sent  to  the  Emperor  Leopold,  menaced  by  the 
Ottomans,  a  re-enforcement  of  6000  men,  and  thus  shared 
the  victory  of  St.  Gothard  (1664).  He  participated  equally 
in  the  defense  of  Candia  by  the  Venetians.  From  1645  *o 
1669  more  than  50,000  Frenchmen  passed  over  into  that 
island.  Their  last  leader,  the  Duke  of  Beaufort,  the  ancient 
king  of  the  markets,  perished  there. 

This  assistance,  lent  to  the  enemies  of  the  Ottomans, 
seemed  glorious,  but  it  was  an  abandonment  of  the  tradi- 
tional policy  of  France.  Louis  renounced  the  alliance  with 
the  Ottomans,  as  shortly  after  he  renounced  alliance  with 
the  Protestants.  Then  he  assumed  the  role  of  Charles  V. 
and  Philip  II.  as  armed  leader  of  Catholicism  and  as  an 
absolute  monarch,  aspiring  to  ascendency  in  Europe.  This 
ambition  was  to  bring  disaster  upon  France  as  it  had  brought 
ruin  on  Spain. 

The  death  of  Philip  IV.  in  1665  was  the  occasion  of  the 
first  war  of  Louis  XIV.  It  was  a  custom  in  Brabant  that 
at  the  father's  death  the  children  of  either  sex  by  the  first 
marriage  should  enter  into  possession  of  the  heritage  to  the 
detriment  of  the  sons  of  the  second  marriage.  Maria 
Theresa  was  the  child  of  the  first  wife  of  Philip  IV. ;  the 
new  king  of  Spain,  Charles  II.,  of  the  second.  In  the  name 
of  his  wife  Louis  XIV.  claimed  the  Netherlands.  He 
wished  to  make  the  Rhine  the  boundary  of  France. 
Hugues  de  Lionne  displayed  much  skill  in  isolating  Spain 
from  all  support.  He  was  able  to  persuade  the  Dutch  that 
the  king  desired  only  the  western  part  of  the  Netherlands; 
he  obtained  the  support  of  Portugal  and  the  neutrality  of 
England,  whose  king,  Charles  II.,  witty  but  prodigal,  reck- 
less and  dissolute,  had  just  sold  Dunkirk  and  Mardick  to 
France  for  5,000,000  francs.  As  for  the  emperor,  he  at 
first  controlled  him  by  the  princes  of  the  Rhenish  League, 


34°  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE,          [BOOK  V. 

who  promised  troops  to  France;  he  even  induced  him  to 
sign  with  France  a  treaty  providing  for  the  eventual  partition 
of  the  Spanish  monarchy. 

Spain  single-handed  could  not  resist.  In  less  than  three 
months  Charleroi,  Binche,  Berg-St.-Vinox,  Fumes,  Ath, 
Tournay,  Douai,  Fort  Scarpe,  Courtrai,  Oudenard,  and 
Lille  were  forced  to  capitulate  (1667).  The  king  continued 
hostilities  during  the  winter;  Dole,  Salins,  and  Besancon 
surrendered  the  same  week.  At  the  end  of  seventeen  days 
Franche-Comte  was  conquered.  The  Council  of  Spain, 
indignant  at  the  slight  resistance,  wrote  to  the  governor 
"that  the  King  of  France  should  have  sent  his  lackeys  to 
take  possession  of  the  country  instead  of  going  there  in 
person"  (1668). 

Seeing  this  rapid  progress,  the  maritime  powers  became 
alarmed  and  united  to  save  Spain.  Holland,  England,  and 
Sweden  signed  a  treaty  at  The  Hague,  celebrated  under  the 
name  of  the  Triple  Alliance,  whereby  they  offered  their 
mediation  to  Louis  XIV.  and  imposed  it  upon  the  King  of 
Spain.  Louis  XIV.  lacked  audacity;  he  desisted  and 
signed  the  peace  of  Aix-la-Chapelle.  He  surrendered 
Franche-Comte",  but  retained  twelve  strongholds  that  he  had 
captured  in  the  Netherlands  (1668). 

Louis  cherished  profound  ill  will  against  the  Dutch,  and 
especially  against  the  great  pensioner  John  de  Witt.  He 
had  been  wounded  by  the  republican  pride  of  their  ambas- 
sador, Van  Beuningen,  an  alderman  of  Amsterdam,  in  the 
conferences  of  Aix-la-Chapelle.  "Do  you  not  trust  the 
king's  word?"  de  Lionne  said  to  him  one  day.  "I  am 
ignorant  of  the  king's  wishes,"  he  replied;  "I  consider  his 
power."  The  existence  of  this  merchant  republic,  free, 
powerful,  and  rich,  grated  upon  his  instincts  of  absolute 
king.  He  accused  the  Dutch  of  ingratitude,  because  so 
long  aided  by  France  they  had  dared  to  turn  against  her. 
Colbert  himself  detested  these  rivals  of  French  commerce. 
We  have  seen  his  efforts  to  drive  them  from  the  French 
coast  and  to  force  French  merchants  to  transport  their  own 
goods.  The  Dutch,  attacked  by  tariffs,  defended  them- 
selves by  increased  charges  upon  French  wines,  brandies,  and 
manufactured  goods  (1670).  "It  is  a  very  bold  step  for  the 
States,"  Colbert  immediately  wrote  to  the  French  ambassa- 
dor at  The  Hague;  "you  will  soon  see  that  they  will  have 
every  cause  to  repent." 


CHAP.  XXI.]  THE  REIGN  OF  LOUIS  XIV.  34* 

Louvois  for  his  part  thought  that  "the  real  means  of 
achieving  the  conquest  of  the  Spanish  Netherlands  was  to 
humble  and  annihilate  the  Dutch.'5  Thus  for  once  the 
Minister  of  Finance  was  not  opposed  to  the  plans  of  the 
Minister  of  War,  and  the  king,  himself  quite  carried  away  by 
his  resentments,  was  inclined  to  accept  them.  It  was  an 
impolitic  war,  however,  which  overturned  the  whole  system 
of  alliance  founded  by  Henry  IV.  and  Richelieu  with  the 
Protestant  states^  which  turned  aside  the  French  blows  from 
the  only  adversary  whom  the  French  then  had  an  interest  in 
striking,  and  which  inprudently  led  them  far  from  their 
frontier,  beyond  the  lower  Rhines  into  a  country  useless 
when  conquered  and  impossible  to  retain  so  long  as  the 
Spaniards  remained  at  Brussels. 

Louis  XIV.  had  no  difficulty  in  breaking  the  Triple 
Alliance  In  consideration  of  a  small  sum  of  money, 
Sweden  was  eager  to  return  to  her  former  friendship  with 
France=  Charles  II.,  who  aspired  to  absolute  power, 
promised  his  compliance  in  consideration  of  a  pension  of 
2,000,000  francs.  Treaties  were  renewed  with  the  princes  of 
the  League  of  the  Rhine  and  with  the  emperor.  Thus  Louis 
isolated  Holland,  as  he  had  isolated  Spain  in  the  war  of 
devolution.  The  opening  of  hostilities  was  disastrous  to 
the  Dutch.  The  de  Witts,  leaders  of  the  republican  party, 
had  neglected  the  army  through  fear  of  the  house  of  Nassau; 
and  Holland  could  only  oppose  25,000  militia  poorly 
equipped,  without  discipline  or  courage,  to  the  120,000 
Frenchmen  who  invaded  its  territory  under  the  command  of 
Turenne  and  Conde  (1672).  It  was  rather  a  promenade 
than  a  war.  Trie  famous  passage  of  the  Rhine,  Napoleon 
said,  was  "only  a  fourth-rate  military  operation,  because  at 
Toll-Huy  the  river  was  fordable,  partly  drained  by  the 
Woal,  and  moreover,  was  defended  only  by  a  handful  of 
men."  All  the  towns  opened  their  gates.  "Send  me  fifty 
horsemen,"  one  of  his  officers  wrote  to  Turenne;  '"with 
them  I  can  take  two  or  three  places."  One  day  four 
soldiers,  while  marauding,  lost  their  way  and  arrived  at 
Muyden;  the  frightened  magistrates  hastened  to  give  them 
the  keys  of  the  town;  then  seeing  that  they  were  not  fol- 
lowed, intoxicated  them  and  led  them  outside  the  walls. 
Now  it  was  at  Muyden  that  Amsterdam  could  be  taken,  for 
the  locks  were  there  which  served  to  flood  the  suburbs  of 
the  city. 


342  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

The  French  were  only  a  few  leagues  from  Amsterdam; 
the  king,  elated  at  such  rapid  success,  rejected  the  propo- 
sitions of  John  de  Witt.  At  least  he  should  have  listened 
to  the  sage  advice  of  Turenne  and  dismantled  the  forts 
instead  of  scattering  the  army  in  garrisons.  They  were  not 
strong  enough  to  march  upon  the  capital.  This  inactivity 
caused  the  loss  of  everything;  the  Dutch  regained  courage. 
A  popular  movement  broke  out  against  John  de  Witt.  This 
great  citizen  was  torn  in  pieces  at  The  Hague  together  with 
his  brother  Cornelius:  and  William  of  Nassau,  Prince  of 
Orange,  was  proclaimed  stadtholder.  No  man  ever  hated 
France  more  or  did  her  more  injury,  or  serve  his  country 
better.  He  suddenly  gave  a  new  energy  to  resistance. 
The  dikes  which  defended  Holland  against  the  sea  were 
destroyed,  the  floodgates  opened,  and  Ruyter,  who  for 
three  months  had  held  in  check  the  Anglo-French  fleet, 
ranged  his  vessels  about  Amsterdam.  Holland  was  saved. 
The  French  withdrew  before  the  inundation,  evacuated  all 
the  conquered  forts  successively,  and  retired  to  the  Rhine 
(1672). 

At  the  same  time  William  made  negotiations  and  formed 
a  formidable  coalition  against  France.  Charles  II.  opposed 
his  Parliament  and  refused  to  enter  it;  he  was,  however, 
forced  to  grant  peace  to  the  United  Provinces,  and  Louis 
XIV.  had  no  effective  ally  save  Sweden  against  coalesced 
Spain,  Austria,  Germany,  and  Holland. 

To  all  these  menaces  Louis  replied  by  the  capture  of 
Maestricht  (1673)  and  the  following  year  by  the  conquest  of 
Franche-Comte,  of  which  he  took  possession  in  six  weeks. 
The  members  of  the  coalition  prepared  a  double  invasion, 
by  the  Netherlands  and  by  Alsace ;  Conde  headed  the 
defense  against  the  first,  Turenne  against  the  second. 
Turenne  devastated  the  Palatinate,  and  with  a  handful 
of  men  defended  the  Rhenish  frontier  against  Montecuculli. 
Overwhelmed,  however,  by  numbers,  he  withdrew,  and 
60,000  Imperialists  took  up  their  winter  quarters  in  Alsace. 
"France  must  not  have  a  single  soldier  absent  from  the 
army  while  there  is  a  German  in  Alsace,"  he  wrote  to  the 
king;  re-enforced  by  a  few  thousand  men,  he  wheeled  around 
the  Vosges  unexpectedly,  fell  upon  the  enemy,  who  were 
dispersed,  defeated  them,  and  pursued  them  beyond  the 
Rhine  after  destroying  half  of  their  number  (January,  1675). 
The  death  of  this  great  general  a  few  months  later  at  Sasbach, 


CHAP.  XXI.]  THE  KEIGM  OF  LOUIS  XIV.  343 

and  Conde's  retreat  after  his  bloody  victory  at  Seneffe 
(1674)  and  a  glorious  campaign  in  Alsace  (1675),  did  not 
prevent  Louis  XIV.  from  maintaining  almost  everywhere 
the  advantage. 

At  sea  Duquesne  annihilated  the  Spanish  fleet  in  three 
bloody  engagements  upon  the  Sicilian  coast  in  spite  of  the 
assistance  of  a  Dutch  squadron  under  Ruyter,  who  was  killed 
in  the  fight  at  Agosta;  at  the  same  time  d'Estrees  ravaged 
the  Dutch  colonies  in  the  Antilles  and  at  Senegal.  By 
land  Cre'qui  obtained  a  glorious  revenge  at  Kochersberg 
for  a  defeat  experienced  the  year  preceding  at  Consarbruck 
(1677),  and  Luxemburg  gained  for  Monsieur,  the  king's 
brother,  the  victory  of  Cassel,  captured  Valenciennes  in 
broad  daylight  with  his  musketeers  (1667),  and  seized 
Ghent  under  the  eyes  of  the  king. 

These  successes  obliged  the  Dutch  to  sue  for  peace. 
The  defection  of  Charles  II.  under  compulsion  of  his  Par- 
liament decided  Louis  XIV.  to  grant  it.  By  the  treaty  of 
Nimeguen  the  Dutch  obtained  restitution  of  all  that  they 
had  lost  (1678).  Thenceforth  Louis  XIV.  could  speak  as 
master  to  the  other  powers  and  dictate  to  them  his  condi- 
tions. Once  again  Spain  paid  the  expenses  of  the  war. 
She  ceded  Franche-Comte,  and  in  the  Netherlands  the  two 
remaining  towns  of  Artois,  Aire  and  St.  Omer,  besides 
Valenciennes,  Bouchain,  Conde,  Cambrai,  Ypres,  Mau- 
beuge,  and  several  other  places.  As  for  the  emperor,  he  ob- 
tained Philippsburg  but  lost  Freiburg.  The  king  compelled 
Denmark  and  Brandenburg  to  surrender  all  the  conquests 
that  they  had  made  from  Sweden  (treaty  of  St.  Germain- 
en-Laye,  1679).  France,  therefore,  emerged  glorious  and 
stronger  from  her  struggle  against  Europe;  the  Hotel  de 
Ville  at  Paris  conferred  upon  the  king  the  name  of  Great. 

Thus  the  first  period  of  the  reign  of  Louis  XIV.  ended 
with  profit  and  glory.  Two  extensive  provinces  were 
added  to  the  territory,  Flanders  and  Franche-Comte'.  The 
possession  of  Flanders  protected  the  northern  French  fron- 
tier, sheltered  the  capital  by  a  triple  band  of  strongholds 
which  Vauban  constructed,  added  to  the  French  an  indus- 
trious population,  whose  industry,  long  dormant  under 
Spanish  rule,  awakened  and  became  fruitful.  The  acquisi- 
tion of  Franche-Comte  completed  the  eastern  frontier,  and 
achieved  in  that  direction  what  the  treaties  of  Westphalia 
had  begun. 


344  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

After  the  treaty  of  Nimeguen  France  continued  its 
aggrandizement.  The  other  nations  disbanded  their  troops; 
Con  uests  b  Louis  kept  all  his  on  a  war  footing  and  made 
Louis  xiv.  in  of  the  peace  a  time  of  conquests.  The  last 
re™ocltiopneacof  treaties  had  transferred  to  him  a  certain 
the  edict  of  number  of  towns  and  cantons  "with  their 

Nantes  (1685).  ,  j          •        i  •        T.        •  i      . 

dependencies.  To  investigate  what  were 
these  dependencies  he  established  at  Metz,  Brisach,  and 
Besancon  so-called  chambers  of  reunion,  because  they  were 
charged  with  reuniting  to  France  the  lands  which  he 
claimed  had  been  dismembered  from  the  three  bishoprics, 
Alsace,  and  Franche-Comte.  The  Elector  Palatine,  other 
German  princes,  and  the  King  of  Spain  were  to  prove  their 
titles  of  possession  before  these  tribunals;  and  decisions 
without  appeal,  sustained  by  force,  gave  Louis  XIV.  twenty 
important  towns,  among  them  Sarrebruck,  Deux-Ponts, 
Luxemburg,  Montbe"liard,  and  especially  Strasburg,  which 
had  remained  free  although  Alsace  had  become  a  French 
possession.  It  was  suddenly  invested  by  20,000  men  com- 
manded by  Louvois,  forced  to  capitulate,  and  Vauban  there 
immediately  began  those  immense  works  which  made  it,  for 
the  wars  of  that  time,  the  strongest  barrier  of  the  kingdom 
upon  the  Rhine  (1681). 

The  colors  of  France  were  displayed  in  other  places,  and 
the  cause  was  more  legitimate.  The  Barbary  states, 
formerly  chastised  by  the  Duke  of  Beaufort,  had  recom- 
menced their  piracies.  The  aged  Duquesne  was  sent 
against  them;  and  bomb-boats,*  a  new  invention  due  to 
the  genius  of  an  obscure  sailor,  Bernard  Renaud,  called  by 
his  comrades  the  little  Renaud,  gave  the  war  a  terrible  im- 
petus. Algiers  was  twice  bombarded  ( 1 68 1  and  1683),  partly 
destroyed,  and  obliged  to  surrender  its  prisoners.  Tunis 
and  Tripoli  experienced  the  same  fate,  and  for  a  short 
time  the  Mediterranean  was  cleared  of  corsairs. 

A  Christian  city  was  treated  like  these  haunts  of  pirates. 
It  was  said  that  the  Genoese  had  sold  arms  and  powder  to 
the  Algerians,  and  were  constructing  in  their  dockyards 
four  warships  for  Spain,  which  had  none.  Louis  XIV.  for- 
bade them  to  launch  the  vessels;  upon  their  refusal  a  fleet, 
still  commanded  by  Duquesne,  departed  from  Toulon  to 

*  Vessels  carrying  a  battery  of  mortars  on  a  false  deck  and  formidable 
in  bombardment. — ED. 


CHAP.  XXL]  THE  REIGN  OF  LOUIS  XIV.  345 

enforce  the  demands  of  France.  The  new  Minister  of  the 
Navy,  the  Marquis  of  Seignelay,  son  of  the  great  Colbert, 
who  had  just  died,  was  himself  upon  the  fleet.  Fourteen 
thousand  bombs,  thrown  in  a  few  days,  destroyed  many 
of  the  sumptuous  palaces  of  Genoa  the  Superb;  the  doge 
was  obliged  to  go  to  Versailles  and  beg  pardon  (1685). 

Even  the  Pope  was  once  more  humbled  as  a  prince  and 
wounded  as  a  pontiff.  The  Catholic  ambassadors  at  Rome 
had  extended  to  their  quarter  in  the  city  the  right  of  asylum 
and  immunity,  always,  and  with  reason,  the  prerogative  of 
their  residence.  Innocent  XI.  wished  to  remove  this  abuse, 
'which  made  half  of  the  city  an  asylum  for  criminals.  With- 
out difficulty  he  obtained  the  consent  of  the  other  sovereigns, 
but  Louis  XIV.,  already  irritated  against  the  pontiff  because 
of  the  regale*  haughtily  replied  "that  he  had  never  been 
guided  by  another's  example,  and  that  it  was  for  him  to  set 
one."  He  sent  the  Marquis  of  Lavardin  with  800  armed 
noblemen  to  maintain  his  possession  of  an  unjust  privilege. 
The  Pope  excommunicated  the  ambassador ;  the  king  caused 
the  seizure  of  Avignon  (1687). 

This  affair  was  settled  under  the  successor  of  Innocent 
XI. ;  but  the  consequent  profound  displeasure  of  that  pontiff 
was  not  without  influence  upon  the  war  which  broke  out  in 
1688.  The  occasion  of  this  war  was  really  the  opposition 
made  by  the  Pope  to  the  French  candidate  for  the  archiepis- 
copal  see  at  Cologne,  the  Cardinal  of  Furstemburg,  who 
had  already  opened  the  gates  of  Strasburg.  He  had  been 
elected  by  a  majority  of  the  chapter,  fifteen  votes  against 
nine  obtained  by  his  competitor,  Clement  of  Bavaria.  In- 
nocent XI.  nevertheless  invested  the  latter.  Louis  XIV. 
protested  in  arms  against  this  nomination,  and  Bonn,  Neuss, 
and  Kayserwerth  were  occupied  by  his  troops  (1688). 
On  the  side  toward  Germany  he  still  claimed  unjustly  a 
part  of  the  Palatinate  in  the  name  of  his  sister-in-law,  the 
Duchess  of  Orleans,  the  second  wife  of  Monsieur.  In  Italy 
he  purchased  Casale  in  Montferrat  of  the  Duke  of  Mantua  to 
command  the  north  of  the  peninsula,  and  Piedmont,  which 
he  held  by  Pignerol  (1681). 

*  Right  possessed  by  the  king  to  the  enjoyment  of  the  revenues  of 
vacant  bishoprics  and  archbishoprics,  and  of  appointing  to  the  dependent 
offices.  By  the  two  edicts  of  1673  and  1782  Louis  XIV.  definitely  formu- 
lated these  rights,  and  aided  by  Bossuet,  established  the  independence  of 
the  Gallican  Church. — ED. 


346  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

These  conquests,  made  in  time  of  peace,  these  violences, 
this  pride,  aroused  the  fears  of  Europe.  France  was 
accused  of  having  destroyed  the  Austrian  domination  in 
order  to  establish  her  own  in  its  place,  and  to  weigh  like  it 
upon  the  Continent.  Already  in  1681  the  empire,  the 
Emperor  Leopold,  Spain,  Holland,  and  even  Sweden,  had 
concluded,  at  the  instigation  of  William  of  Orange,  a  secret 
alliance  for  the  maintenance  of  the  peace  of  Nimeguen;  but 
no  one  dared  to  strike  the  first  blow;  the  diet  of  Ratisbon 
(August,  1684)  stipulated  a  truce  of  twenty  years,  allowing 
the  King  of  France  to  retain  Luxemburg,  Landau,  Stras- 
burg,  Kehl,  and  the  other  towns  reunited  before  August  12, 
1681.  His  ambition  increasing,  they  united  more  closely 
and  signed  the  League  of  Augsburg  (July  9,  1686),  to  which 
Savoy  acceded  the  following  year  and  England  in  1689. 

At  this  critical  moment  what  was  the  condition  of 
France?  A  sort  of  fatigue,  of  internal  uneasiness,  began  to 
make  itself  felt  in  that  society  still  so  brilliant.  The  excess- 
ive expenses  of  the  preceding  war,  the  costly  maintenance 
of  an  army  of  150,000  men  in  time  of  peace,  and  magnifi- 
cent constructions,  as  those  of  Versailles,  Trianon,  Marly, 
the  Louvre,  or  useful  ones,  as  those  of  harbors  and  the  Hotel 
des  Invalides,  had  hopelessly  involved  the  finances. 

Colbert  was  exhausted  in  finding  resources;  he  too  was 
obliged  to  sell  offices,  create  annuities  at  an  onerous  rate, 
and  to  augment  the  villain  tax;  he  groaned  at  bringing  back 
the  finances  into  the  state  from  which  he  had  rescued  them. 
He  succumbed  under  the  burden.  He  died*  in  1683  at 
the  age  of  sixty-four,  exhausted  by  excess  of  work,  and  killed 
perhaps  by  the  unjust  reproaches  of  the  king.  "  If  I  had  done 
for  God  what  I  have  done  for  this  man,"  he  said  bitterly, 
"I  should  be  sure  of  salvation  ten  times  over,  and  now  I  do 
not  know  what  is  to  become  of  me."  His  ministry  was 
divided;  the  Marquis  of  Seignelay,  his  son,  took  the  navy; 
the  finances  were  intrusted  to  Le  Pelletier  (1683-89),  and 
later  to  the  Count  of  Pontchartrain  (1689-99).  These  last 
two  succeeded  but  did  not  replace  him. 

Two  years  after  Colbert's  death  Louis  XIV.  committed 
the  greatest  fault  of  his  reign  in  the  revocation  of  the  edict 

*  Despite  his  immense  services  Colbert  died  not  only  disliked  by  the 
thankless  king  but  so  detested  by  the  people  that  his  remains  had  to  be 
interred  secretly  and  at  night  for  fear  of  outrage  by  the  Parisians. — ED. 


CHAP.  XXI.]          THE  REIGN  OF  LOUIS  XIV.  347 

of  Nantes.  As  long  as  Colbert  had  lived  he  had  protected 
the  Protestants  as  useful  and  industrious  subjects.  But 
Louis  saw  in  them  only  former  rebels,  who  had  dictated 
laws  to  his  predecessors,  and  he  hated  them  as  heretics,  and 
suspected  them  of  little  love  for  the  absolute  power  of 
kings. 

Religious  unity  in  the  state  seemed  to  him  as  necessary  as 
political  unity.  After  the  treaty  of  Nimeguen  the  different 
interests  which  were  disputing  for  control  over  Louis  XIV., 
then  becoming  an  old  man,  rendered  the  government  more 
rigorous.  The  king  was  then  having  lively  quarrels  with 
the  Holy  See  on  the  subject  of  the  regale,  but  he  did  not, 
however,  want  his  zeal  for  the  Church  to  be  disputed. 
Through  the  Protestants  the  proof  of  his  Catholicism  could 
be  furnished.  They  were  robbed  successively  of  all  the 
guarantees  which  the  edict  of  Nantes  had  assured  them  ; 
missions  were  multiplied  in  the  provinces,  and  consciences 
were  bought  for  money.  Louvois,  who  was  determined  to 
show  his  zeal  in  this  matter,  "thought  to  interfere  in  it  by 
the  army":  he  placed  dragoons  in  the  houses  of  the  Calvin- 
ists.  These  booted  missionaries  committed  the  greatest 
excesses.  As  the  dragoons  distinguished  themselves  espe- 
cially by  their  violence,  the  performance  was  called  the 
"dragonades." 

Finally,  the  last  blow  was  struck,  and  October  22,  1685, 
an  edict  appeared  which  revoked  that  of  Nantes.  The 
Protestants  were  forbidden  the  public  exercise  of  their 
religion  except  in  Alsace ;  their  ministers  were  ordered  to 
quit  the  kingdom  in  fifteen  days,  and  the  laity  were  for- 
bidden to  follow  them  under  pain  of  the  galleys  and  con- 
fiscation of  goods.  Monstrous  consequences  ensued;  the 
Reformers  had  no  civil  status;  their  marriages,  if,  by 
means  of  fraud  and  falsehood,  they  had  not  been  sanc- 
tioned by  the  Catholic  Church,  were  regarded  as  null, 
their  children  as  illegitimate.  The  goods  of  every  attested 
heretic  were  confiscated.  A  part  was  assured  to  the 
denouncer. 

In  spite  of  the  police  of  Louis  XIV.  from  250,000  to 
300,000  Reformers  crossed  the  frontier  during  the  last  years 
of  the  seventeenth  century,  and  carried  to  foreign  countries 
French  arts  and  manufactures  and  hatred  of  France.  Entire 
regiments  of  Calvinists  were  formed  in  Holland,  in  England, 
in  Germany ;  those  who  remained  in  the  kingdom  only 


34^  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE. 

waited  for  an  opportunity  to  break  the  iniquitous  yoke 
which  weighed  upon  them,  even  at  the  cost  of  a  civil  war. 
Did  these  violences  succeed?  Before  the  revocation  of  the 
the  edict  of  Nantes  there  were  a  million  Protestants  in 
France;  to-day  there  are  from  fifteen  to  eighteen  hundred 
thousand. 


CHAPTER   XXIL 

REVOLUTION  OF  1688  IN  ENGLAND.  —  SECOND  AND 
THIRD  COALITIONS  AGAINST  FRANCE.— PEACE  OF 
RYSWICK  (1697)  AND  OF  UTRECHT  (1713). 


Charles  II.  and  James  II.  (1660-88). — Wars  of  the  League  of  Augsburg 
(1688-97)  and  of  the  Spanish  Succession  (1701-13). 


THE  response  of  the  Protestant  powers  to  the  revocation 

of  the  edict  of  Nantes  was  the  English  Revolution,  which 

hurled  the  Catholic  Tames  II.  from  the  throne 

Charles        II.  ,  J  /•      -i         ,-.    i    •    • 

and  james  ii.  and  caused  the  accession  of  the  Calvmist 
William  III. 

Louis  had  understood  that  he  would  have  nothing  to  fear 
from  the  enmity  of  Europe  as  long  as  he  preserved  alliance 
with  England.  Therein,  in  fact,  lay  the  secret  of  his 
strength,  which  then  he  would  not  be  obliged  to  divide  by 
sending  half  upon  the  ocean  and  half  upon  the  continent. 
Thus  he  had  spared  no  pains  to  ally  himself  with  Charles  II., 
son  of  Charles  I.,  beheaded  in  London  in  1649,  wno  m 
1660,  after  Cromwell's  death,  had  been  recalled  to  the 
throne  without  conditions. 

It  was  thought  at  first  that  this  frivolous  and  profligate 
prince  had  gained  some  experience  from  his  exile.  In  the 
first  years,  thanks  to  the  counsels  of  Clarendon,  his  coun- 
selor, he  appeared  very  willing  to  establish  the  predom- 
inance of  the  crown  while  allowing  Parliament  to  enjoy  its 
former  privileges ;  and  he  remained  faithful  to  the  Protes- 
tantism of  the  Anglican  Church,  deviating  neither  to  right 
nor  left,  neither  toward  the  Catholics  nor  toward  the  Presby- 
terians. If  in  1662  he  had  sold  to  Louis  XIV.  Dunkirk 
and  Mardick,  Cromwell's  precious  conquests,  he  had  re- 
paired this  mistake  in  1668  by  uniting  with  Sweden  and 
Holland  to  check  the  progress  of  France  in  the  Nether- 
lands. But  in  the  second  part  of  his  reign  he  allied  liim- 

349 


35°  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

self  with  the  Catholics  in  order  to  obtain  their  aid  in  render- 
ing his  power  absolute;  as  Louis  XIV.  was  endeavoring  to 
secure  the  triumph  of  Catholicism  and  royalty  upon  the 
Continent,  he  sought  his  support,  and  did  not  hesitate  to 
barter  the  honor  and  interests  of  England.  Until  his  death 
he  received  from  Louis  a  pension  of  2,000,000  francs ;  at  the 
same  time,  that  he  might  better  be  held  in  dependence,  the 
French  ambassadors  encouraged  by  subsidies  the  opposition 
of  Parliament  against  the  Stuarts.  It  was  indeed  a  Machia- 
vellian policy,  but  the  king  thought  no  means  of  neutralizing 
the  ill  will  of  the  English  Parliament  too  dear  a  purchase. 
Louis  so  influenced  Charles  II.  in  the  war  against  Holland 
that  his  people  followed  for  a  time  in  the  hope  of  inheriting 
the  Dutch  commerce. 

Finally,  England  grew  indignant  at  such  a  bargain,  which 
threatened  both  her  religion  and  her  liberty.  The  opposi- 
tion, weak  at  first,  grew  stronger,  and  the  former  pensioners 
of  Louis  went  farther  than  he  desired.  In  1674  the  Whigs, 
or  those  who  defended  the  Anglican  Church  and  parliamen- 
tary prerogatives  against  the  Tories,  became  sufficiently 
powerful  to  force  Charles  II.  to  conclude  peace  with  Hol- 
land, but  were  unable  as  yet  to  obtain  a  declaration  of  war 
against  France.  The  preceding  year  they  had  obliged  him 
to  sanction  the  Test  Bill,  which  compelled  every  officer  to 
make  oath  that  he  did  not  believe  in  transubstantiation,  and 
thus  debarred  Catholics  from  public  offices.  In  1678  the 
two  Houses  were  closed  to  them,  an  exclusion  lasting  until 
1829.  That  same  year  a  vulgar  intriguer,  Titus  Gates, 
conceived  the  famous  Popish  Plot.  Terror  was  universal. 
It  was  even  thought  that  the  great  fire  of  London  in  1666 
had  been  the  work  of  the  papists  and  that  they  were  about 
to  begin  anew ;  the  people  firmly  believed  that  the  Pope 
dreamed  of  the  conquest  of  England.  This  credulity  was 
equally  cruel  and  ridiculous.  Eight  Jesuits  were  hanged, 
and  the  venerable  Viscount  Strafford,  condemned  to  a 
traitor's  death  despite  his  seventy  years,  obtained  a  commu- 
tation of  sentence  only  by  the  king's  intervention.  Instead 
of  being  hanged  and  quartered  he  was  beheaded.  The 
Duke  of  York,  brother  of  Charles  II.  and  heir  presump- 
tive, had  abjured  Protestantism  ;  the  Commons  wished  by  a 
bill  to  deprive  him  of  his  rights. 

The  king,  defeated  upon  the  religious  question,  was  at 
the  same  time  beaten  in  the  political.  England  prepared  to 


CHAP.  XXII.]    REVOLUTION  OF  1688  IN  ENGLAND.       351 

side  with  Holland.  To  prevent  this  alliance  Louis  XIV. 
signed  the  peace  of  Nimeguen. 

Charles  dissolved  this  Parliament,  become  so  hostile;  the 
elections  furnished  another  still  more  hostile  to  the  court. 
One  of  its  first  acts  was  to  vote  the  Bill  of  Habeas  Corpus 
(1679).  This  law,  one  of  the  greatest  conquests  won  by 
the  English  over  despotism,  already  existed  in  the  Magna 
Charta;  but  it  had  been  evaded  through  the  cleverness  of 
lawyers  and  the  oppressive  measures  of  the  government. 
By  virtue  of  the  bill  of  1679  no  judge  could  refuse  to  any 
prisoner  whatever,  within  the  first  twenty-four  hours  of  his 
imprisonment,  the  writ  of  habeas  corpus,  which  obliged  the 
jailer  to  produce  him  before  the  court  designated  in  the 
writ,  and  in  which  the  cause  of  his  imprisonment  should  be 
declared;  if  released  by  the  court  he  could  never  again  be 
imprisoned  on  the  same  charge.  Moreover,  in  a  large 
number  of  cases  the  judges  were  obliged  to  accept  bail 
offered  by  the  accused,  and  the  practice  of  banishment  from 
the  kingdom  in  order  to  free  offenders  from  the  ordinary 
jurisdiction  was  abolished. 

England,  therefore,  in  peace  and  by  means  of  law  was 
accomplishing  her  internal  revolution,  when  a  violent  party 
compromised  all  by  an  assassination  and  civil  war.  The 
Puritans  in  Scotland  revolted,  and  marked  their  seizure 
of  arms  by  the  murder  of  the  primate  Archbishop  of  St. 
Andrews  (1680).  They  were  crushed  at  Bothwell  Bridge 
upon  the  Clyde  by  the  Duke  of  Monmouth,  natural  son  of 
Charles  II.,  and  atrocious  executions  followed  the  victory. 

Another  criminal  attempt,  the  Rye  House  Plot,  occa- 
sioned other  punishments  which  did  not  seem  deserved 
and  which  agitated  England  deeply.  Two  men,  the  pride 
of  the  Whig  party,  the  republican  Algernon  Sidney  and 
William  Russell,  who  belonged  to  one  of  the  most  illustrious 
English  houses,  perished  upon  the  scaffold  (1683).  In 
consternation,  the  opposition  kept  silent,  and  at  the  death 
of  Charles  II.  the  Duke  of  York,  fifty  years  of  age,  without 
opposition  was  proclaimed  king,  in  spite  of  the  bill  of  the 
Commons  whereby  he  was  excluded  from  the  throne  (1685). 

Educated  like  the  whole  Stuart  family  in  ideas  of  absolute 
power,  James  II.  drew  still  closer  the  bonds  of  alliance 
formed  by  his  brother  with  Louis  XIV.  He  wished  to 
accomplish  two  things  equally  odious  to  England:  the  re- 
establishment  of  Catholicism,  and  the  overthrow  of  public 


35 2  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

liberty.  This  his  brother  had  secretly  attempted ;  he 
undertook  the  task  openly  and  without  reserve,  for  he  had 
more  zeal  and  obstinacy  than  ability,  and  he  was  deceived 
by  the  apparent  resignation  of  England  after  the  death  of 
Sidney  and  Russell,  Immediately  on  his  accession  the 
nation  saw  him  prorogue  the  Commons  indefinitely,  govern 
regardless  of  law,  and  defy  the  most  intense  sentiments  of 
the  people  by  attending  mass  with  all  the  pomp  which  charac- 
terized Louis  XIV.  when  about  to  worship  in  his  palace  at 
Versailles.  The  exiles  believed  the  government  of  James 
II.  was  so  detested  as  to  fall  at  the  first  shock.  Argyle 
landed  in  Scotland,  and  Monmouth  in  England.  Both 
perished,  the  first  without  being  able  to  strike  a  blow,  the 
second  after  the  bloody  day  at  Sedgemoor  near  Bridge- 
water  (1685).  In  celebration  of  his  double  victory  James 
II.  caused  two  medals  to  be  struck,  bearing  on  one  side  two 
heads  separated  from  the  body,  on  the  other  side  two  head- 
less trunks.  Yet  one  of  the  victims  was  his  nephew.  Such 
a  king  easily  found  worthy  ministers;  two  have  remained 
notorious  in  the  execration  of  England,  Colonel  Kirke  and 
Chief  Justice  Jeffreys.  The  latter  wrote  to  the  minister 
Sunderland:  "To-day  I  have  begun  my  work  with  the 
rebels,  of  whom  I  have  dispatched  ninety-eight."  Those 
whom  he  did  not  hang  he  sold  to  the  colonies  as  slaves. 
To  reward  so  ardent  zeal  James  appointed  this  butcher 
High  Chancellor  of  England. 

A  part  of  the  English  aristocracy  and  the  clergy  would 
have  pardoned  the  Stuarts  for  their  despotism,  for  these  two 
classes  remembered  their  sufferings  in  the  revolution  of 
1648;  but  they  could  not  tolerate  the  openly  Catholic 
tendencies  of  James  II.  For  the  English  clergy,  so  richly 
endowed  by  the  Reformation,  the  restoration  of  the  Roman 
faith  would  be  ruinous ;  the  aristocracy  for  its  part  feared  the 
loss  of  the  immense  domains  which  it  had  acquired  by  the 
suppression  of  the  monasteries ;  besides,  many  of  its  members 
wished  the  sincere  exercise  of  constitutional  government, 
favorable  to  their  influence,  favorable  also  to  the  great  in- 
terests of  the  country. 

For  a  successful  struggle  against  such  powerful  interests 
an  extremely  able  prince  was  needed.  James  II.,  who  in 
his  youth  had  won  distinction  as  an  admiral,  seemed  to  have 
lost  all  his  ability.  Weak  and  "stubborn  as  a  mule,"  as 
his  brother  used  to  say,  he  marched  toward  his  designs  so 


CHAP.  XXII.]     REVOLUTION  OF  1688  IN  ENGLAND.       353 

blindly  that  according  to  a  cardinal  "he  ought  to  be  ex- 
communicated, because  he  was  going  to  ruin  the  little 
Catholicism  left  in  England."  In  a  Protestant  country  he 
was  seen  to  surround  himself  with  monks,  to  give  place  in 
the  council  to  the  Jesuit  Peters,  to  exempt  Catholics  from 
the  Test  Act,  to  have  himself  addressed  with  the  absolutist 
formula,  A  Deo  rex,  a  rege  lex;  finally,  to  send  to  Italy  a 
solemn  embassy  in  order  to  reconcile  England  with  the 
Roman  Church.  The  Anglican  bishops  protested;  he  threw 
them  into  prison.  The  primate  of  the  kingdom,  the  Arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury,  was  himself  confined  in  the  Tower 
with  six  of  his  suffragans. 

These  violences  rendered  revolution  inevitable.  For  a 
long  time  William  of  Orange  had  been  allied  with  the  leaders 
of  the  Whig  party.  Son-in-law  of  James  II.,  he  was  his 
nearest  heir;  he  could  wait.  But  the  king  in  a  second 
marriage  had  espoused  an  Italian  and  Catholic  princess;  from 
this  union  in  1688  was  born  a  son,  who  superseded  all  the 
claims  of  the  wife  of  William  of  Orange.  Then  the  prince 
hesitated  no  longer;  he  accepted  the  offers  of  the  English 
aristocracy,  and  prepared  to  overthrow  his  father-in-law  with 
the  forces  of  Holland.  In  vain  Louis  XIV.  warned  James 
II.  of  the  dangers  which  he  incurred  and  offered  him  assist- 
ance, which  was  almost  haughtily  refused.  Louis  himself 
committed  a  grave  error:  the  cause  of  James  being  his  own, 
since  it  was  that  of  the  absolute  power  of  kings,  he  should 
have  dispatched  aid  in  spite  of  James ;  this  he  did,  but 
not  enough.  He  sent  an  army  upon  the  Rhine,  which 
aroused  Germany,  instead  of  sending  it  upon  the  Meuse, 
which  would  have  intimidated  the  United  Provinces  and 
possibly  kept  William  at  home.  At  this  news  stocks  rose 
from  10  to  100  in  Holland,  and  William  departed. 

His  fleet  carried  15,000  men,  and  his  colors  this  device: 
"Pro  religione  et  libertate."  He  was  preceded  by  a  mani- 
festo wherein  he  declared  "that,  summoned  by  the  Lords  and 
the  Commons  of  England,  he  had  acquiesced  in  their  wishes, 
because,  as  heir  to  the  crown,  he  was  interested  in  the  pres- 
ervation of  the  national  laws  and  religion."  He  marched 
upon  London  without  meeting  resistance;  everyone  aban- 
doned James — his  prime  minister,  Sunderland,  his  favorite, 
Marlborough,  even  his  second  daughter,  Anne  of  Denmark. 
He  did  not  attempt  to  resist,  and  fled  in  disguise.  Then  a 
long  procession  traversed  the  streets  of  London,  armed  with 


354  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

clubs,  sabers,  lances,  at  the  extremity  of  which  each  had 
fixed  an  orange.  Ribbons  of  the  same  color,  already  the 
color  of  the  Protestant  party,  floated  over  every  head. 
Soon  resounded  the  terrible  cry  of  "No  popery!  Down 
with  popery!"  All  the  Catholic  chapels  and  even  some 
houses  were  demolished.  The  -benches,  chairs,  confes- 
sionals, and  breviaries  were  collected  in  one  heap  and 
burned;  but  not  a  Catholic  lost  his  life,  not  even  Jeffreys. 

Ho\vever,  at  the  moment  when  the  galiot  on  board  of 
which  James  had  fled  was  about  to  set  sail  it  was  boarded 
by  fifty  or  sixty  sailors  in  search  of  Catholic  priests.  The 
king,  whom  they  took  for  a  disguised  Jesuit,  was  at  first 
rudely  treated,  but  a  few  Kentish  noblemen  who  recognized 
him  caused  his  release;  of  this  he  took  advantage  to  return 
to  London  (December  16).  The  following  day  the  Dutch 
soldiers  arrived ;  he  was  obliged  to  depart,  this  time  forever. 
William  had  refused  him  any  interview,  and  the  Lords, 
convened  in  extraordinary  assembly,  had  informed  him  that 
he  must  betake  himself  to  Rochester.  Thither  William  had 
him  conducted  by  a  Dutch  guard,  and  took  care  to  allow  his 
escape.  James  sought  refuge  in  France,  where  Louis  XIV. 
extended  him  a  magnificent  hospitality  (1688). 

Parliament  declared  the  throne  vacant  and  conferred  the 
succession  upon  the  Prince  of  Orange  and  his  wife,  Princess 
Mary ;  after  them  upon  Princess  Anne ;  forever  excluding 
the  other  descendants  of  James  II.  The  Stadtholder  of 
Holland  was  king.  But  before  ascending  the  throne 
William  III.  was  forced  to  sign  the  famous  Declaration  of 
Rights  (February,  1689). 

This  new  charter,  which  substituted  royalty  by  common 
consent  for  royalty  by  divine  right,  contained  almost  all  the 
liberties  and  guarantees  which  the  English  had  claimed  for 
centuries:  the  periodical  convocation  of  Parliament,  the 
control  of  taxation,  the  enactment  of  laws  by  the  agree- 
ment of  the  king  and  the  Houses,  trial  by  jury,  and  the 
right  of  petition.  It  founded  in  England  constitutional  or 
parliamentary  government,  with  all  the  safeguards  and  the 
practical  wisdom  which  have  assured  its  duration. 

Over  against  the  absolute  right  of  kings,  which  for  200 
years  had  controlled  modern  society,  and  which  had  just 
found  its  most  glorious  personification  in  Louis  XIV.,  there 
arose  a  new  right,  that  of  the  people.  In  the  desperate 
struggle  which  broke  out  between  France  and  England 


CHAP.  XXII.]     COALITIONS  AGAINST  FRANCE.  355 

there  was  nothing  surprising.  It  was  more  than  two  con- 
trary interests,  it  was  two  antagonistic  political  claims,  which 
clashed.  Moreover,  in  the  sixteenth  century  France  had 
assumed  the  defense  of  Protestantism  and  of  the  general 
Liberties  of  Europe;  in  the  seventeenth' she  menaced  the 
conscience  of  the  people  and  the  independence  of  the  states. 
The  role  which  the  French  abandoned  England  was  to  seize; 
at  the  same  time  to  satisfy  her  hatred,  three  or  four  cen- 
turies old,  her  envious  jealousy,  and  her  mercantile  interests, 
and  finally,  to  crush  that  greatness  which  gave  her  offense, 
she  was  to  make  herself  the  center  of  every  coalition  against 
the  house  of  Bourbon,  as  France  had  been  the  center  of 
resistance  against  the  house  of  Austria. 

This  political  change  overturned  all  the  conditions  of  the 

war.     While  Louis  had  neutralized  England  by  pensioning 

Wars  of  the   'ts  kings  France  had  no  one  to  fear  upon  the 

League  of  Augs-   Continent ;  for  protected  by  the  Pyrenees,  the 

burg      ^'688-97)     ^^     and      th(J     gea     France     coujd     face     thg 

Spanish  succes-  Rhine  and  fight  with  both  hands,  with  no 
need  to  look  behind.  When  England  united 
with  the  enemies  of  France,  not  only  armies  upon  the 
Scheldt,  Rhine,  and  Alps  were  necessary,  but  fleets  upon  the 
ocean  and  in  the  most  distant  seas.  France  could  not  long 
continue  this  double  effort. 

William  of  Orange,  "the  valiant  and  able  heretic,"  as  he 
was  called  at  Vienna,  Madrid,  and  even  at  Rome,  became 
the  soul  of  the  coalition;  to  overthrow  him  was  to  finish  the 
war  at  a  blow.  Louis  XIV.  intrusted  a  fleet  to  James  II., 
which  carried  him  to  Ireland  in  spite  of  the  English  and 
the  Dutch,  whom  Chateau-Renaud  defeated  in  the  Bay  of 
Bantry  and  Tourville  on  the  coast  of  Sussex  off  Beachy 
Head.  In  the  last  engagement  sixteen  of  the  English 
vessels  were  sunk  or  burned  on  the  shore;  the  rest  took 
refuge  at  the  mouth  of  the  Thames  or  along  the  banks 
of  Holland  (July  10,  1690),  and  for  a  time  Louis  XIV.  held 
the  empire  of  the  ocean.  But  James  II.  did  not  know  how 
to  give  him  aid:  he  lost  the  battle  of  the  Boyne  (July  n, 
1690).  A  regiment  of  fugitive  Calvinists  and  Marshal 
Schomberg  especially  contributed  to  his  defeat.  James  II. 
returned  to  France. 

Louis  XIV.  then  prepared  for  an  invasion  even  of  Eng- 
land; 20,000  men  were  assembled  between  Cherburg  and 
The  Hague;  300  transport  ships  were  held  ready  at 


3  5  6  THE  A  SCENDENC  Y  OF  FRA  NCE.  [BOOK  V. 

Brest ;  Tourville  was  to  escort  them  with  44  vessels  which 
he  commanded  and  30  others  which  d'Estrees  was  bring- 
ing from  Toulon.  But  the  wind  changed;  the  fleet  from 
the  Mediterranean  could  not  arrive  in  time.  Louis  XIV., 
accustomed  to  force  the  victory,  and  relying,  moreover, 
upon  the  defection  of  a  part  of  the  enemies'  captains, 
ordered  his  admiral  to  seek  the  Dutch,  who  had  99 
ships.  Among  them  there  was  no  defection.  Tourville 
fought  ten  hours  without  relaxation;  but  he  could  not  repeat 
a  like  effort  the  following  day;  he  withdrew.  Unfortu- 
nately the  neighboring  coast  was  not  sheltered;  15  vessels 
escaping  to  Cherburg  and  La  Hogue  were  burned  by  their 
own  captains,  who  were  unwilling  they  should  fall  into  the 
hands  of  the  enemy  (1692).  This  disaster  did  not  ruin  the 
French  army,  but  the  contemplated  expedition  was  aban- 
doned. 

As  early  as  1688,  at  the  time  when  William  was  preparing 
his  expedition,  the  French  had  reached  the  Rhine,  and  had 
captured  Philippsburg,  Manheim,  and  Worms;  the  following 
year  they  had  ravaged  the  Palatinate.  One  hundred  thou- 
sand inhabitants,  driven  from  their  country  by  the  flames, 
entreated  Germany  for  revenge.  The  king  himself  re- 
gretted these  horrible  depredations;  and  according  to  report, 
his  dissatisfaction,  a  prelude  of  disgrace,  caused  the  death 
of  Louvois  (1691).  The  war  then  extended  from  the  Alps 
to  the  North  Sea.  But  upon  the  Rhine  it  was  defensive, 
since  Louis  preferred  to  strike  the  heaviest  blows  upon  his 
two  weakest  enemies,  the  Duke  of  Savoy  and  Spain.  The 
Netherlands  bore  the  brunt  of  the  war. 

Luxemburg,  a  pupil  of  Conde,  defeated  the  allies  at 
Fleurus  (1690),  then  at  Steinkirk  (1693),  finally  at  Neer- 
winden  (1693),  and  captured  Mons  and  Namur  before  their 
eyes.  The  seizure  of  Charleroi  was  his  last  triumph ;  he 
died  in  1695.  William  was  more  fortunate  with  his  succes- 
sor, Villeroi,  who  allowed  him  to  re-enter  Namur  (1695). 
For  his  part  Catinat,  victor  at  Staffarde  (1690),  invaded 
Piedmont,  the  larger  part  of  which  he  acquired  by  a  new 
victory,  that  of  Marsaglia.  On  the  sea  Tourville  avenged 
the  defeat  of  La  Hogue  by  the  victory  of  Lagos;  Nes- 
mond,  Pointis,  Duguay-Trouin,  Jean  Bart,  and  a  host  of 
bold  corsairs  ruined  the  commerce  of  England  and 
Holland. 

However,  the  war  languished  everywhere,  and  France  was 


CHAP.  XXII.]     COALITIONS  AGAINST  FRANCE.  357 

exhausted  in  an  unequal  struggle.  "Half  the  kingdom," 
Vauban  wrote,  "lived  on  the  charity  of  the  other  half." 
Besides,  Charles  II.  was  dying;  the  Spanish  succession  was 
about  to  be  opened.  Europe  needed  a  moment  of  repose 
to  prepare  herself  for  that  great  event  which  might  cause  a 
general  war. 

Louis  XIV.  followed  the  same  tactics  as  in  1677;  he 
divided  his  enemies.  The  Duke  of  Savoy  consented  to 
negotiate;  his  states  and  even  Pignerol  were  restored  to 
him,  and  his  daughter  married  the  Duke  of  Burgundy, 
grandson  of  the  French  king  (1696).  The  defection  of 
Savoy  determined  the  allies  to  accept  the  offers  of  France; 
after  brief  negotiations  peace  was  signed  in  the  Congress  of 
Ryswick  (1697).  Louis  XIV.  recognized  William  III.,  sur- 
rendered to  the  empire  all  that  the  chambers  of  reunion 
had  adjudged  to  France  with  the  exception  of  Strasburg, 
Landau,  Sarrelouis,  and  Longwy;  the  Duke  of  Lorraine 
again  possessed  his  duchy;  the  Dutch  had  the  right  of 
maintaining  garrisons  in  certain  places  of  Flanders,  and 
obtained  the  repeal  of  certain  restrictions  inflicted  upon 
their  commerce  by  Colbert. 

The  elder  branch  of  the  house  of  Austria  was  soon  to 
become  extinct  with  Charles  II.  To  whom  would  Spain 
and  her  vast  possessions  belong?  Three  powers,  France, 
Austria,  and  Bavaria,  disputed  the  heritage.  Louis  XIV. 
invoked  the  rights  of  his  wife,  Maria  Theresa,  the  eldest  of 
the  children  of  Philip  IV. ;  Leopold  I.  had  married  the 
younger  infanta,  Marguerite;  the  Elector  of  Bavaria 
vested  his  claim  in  the  rights  of  his  younger  son,  grandson 
of  this  same  Marguerite.  Louis,  not  daring  at  first  to  risk 
a  general  war,  made  overtures  to  William  III. ;  they  were  to 
share  the  Spanish  monarchy  (1698).  Charles  II.  was  in- 
dignant that  they  should  regulate  his  succession  without 
regard  to  him,  and  bequeathed  everything  by  will  to  the 
Prince  Elector  of  Bavaria.  But  that  child  died;  France  and 
Austria  remained  sole  competitors.  Louis  XIV.  proposed 
a  new  division,  which  England  and  Holland  accepted,  and 
which  assured  France  no  great  advantage.  But  Leopold 
refused  to  submit  (1700).  The  king  then  changed  his  pol- 
icy; his  ambassador  at  Madrid,  the  Duke  of  Harcourt, 
appealed  to  the  patriotism  of  the  Spaniards,  wrote,  spoke, 
and  promised  so  well  that  public  opinion  declared  in  favor 
of  France.  The  Council  of  Castile  and  the  Pope  induced 


358  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

Charles  II.  to  choose  as  heir  the  Duke  of  Anjou,  grandson 
of  the  King  of  France  (October  2,  1700). 

However,  Louis  hesitated.  Acceptance  meant  war;  re- 
fusal, the  reconstitution  of  the  house  of  Austria,  no  longer 
divided  into  two  branches,  but  united,  as  under  Charles  V. 
To  share  the  succession  was  dangerous.  Besides,  Leopold 
was  unwilling  to  consent.  Since  war  was  attached  to  every 
alternative,  better  make  it  for  the  whole  than  for  a  part. 
Louis  XIV.  finally  formed  his  resolution,  solemnly  as- 
sembled the  court,  and  presenting  his  grandson,  "Gentle- 
men," he  said,  "behold  the  King  of  Spain!"  Some  weeks 
later,  at  the  moment  of  departure,  he  kissed  him  and 
uttered  the  famous  words:  "The  Pyrenees  exist  no  longer. " 
The  accession  of  Philip  V.  was  welcomed  with  joy  by  all 
the  people  of  the  monarchy.  Europe  even  exhibited  at  first 
only  a  sort  of  stupefaction ;  surprise  seemed  to  paralyze 
anger. 

But  war  was  inevitable;  the  house  of  Bourbon  was  then 
extending  its  dominion  from  the  mouths  of  the  Scheldt  to 
the  Strait  of  Gibraltar,  from  Otranto  to  Brest.  The  project 
of  universal  monarchy  imputed  to  Louis  XIV.  no  longer 
appeared  a  calumny;  and  a  large  party  in  England,  the 
Whigs,  demanded  war  "to  save  the  liberty  of  Europe  and  of 
mankind."  However,  Leopold  would  have  had  much  dif- 
ficulty in  again  forming  the  European  coalition  had  it  not  been 
for  the  rash  provocations  of  the  king.  First  he  dismissed  the 
Dutch  garrisons  from  the  fortresses  in  the  Netherlands  and 
replaced  them  by  French;  not  content  with  thus  making  Hol- 
land anxious,  he  set  England  at  defiance  by  recognizing  at 
the  death  of  James  II.  his  son,  James  III.  This  was  in  open 
violation  of  the  treaty  of  Ryswick  (1701).  Finally,  con- 
trary to  his  promises  and  to  the  interests  of  France,  he 
reserved  to  the  new  King  of  Spain  all  rights  and  his  rank  as 
heir  at  Versailles.  A  new  league  was  concluded  at  The 
Hague  between  England  and  the  United  Provinces. 
Prussia,  the  empire,  Portugal,  and  even  the  Duke  of  Savoy, 
father-in-law  of  Philip  V.,  adhered  to  it  successively  (1701- 
03).  The  death  of  William  III.  (1702),  who  was  succeeded 
by  his  sister-in-law,  Anne,  daughter  of  James  II.,  seemed 
likely  to  destroy  this  coalition;  but  three  men  of  genius 
replaced  him:  Heinsius,  the  great  pensioner  of  Holland; 
Marlborough,  leader  of  the  Whig  party  in  England,  an 
able  diplomat  and  commander;  lastly,  Eugene,  prince  of 


CHAP.  XXII.]     COALITIONS  AGAINST  FRANCE.  359 

the  house  of  Savoy,  born  in  France,  but  whom  the  disdain 
of  Louis  XIV.  had  forced  into  the  service  of  Austria. 
United  in  interests,  ideas,  especially  in  hatred  of  the  king, 
they  agreed  admirably  in  the  conduct  of  military  operations. 

On  the  other  hand  the  decline  of  the  great  king  had  begun. 
Ruled  by  Mme.  de  Maintenon,  he  gave  the  govern- 
ment, not  to  the  most  capable,  but  to  the  most  courtly. 
The  mediocre  Chamillart  undertook  the  functions  of  Lou- 
vois  and  those  of  Colbert;  the  incapable  Villeroi  replaced 
Turenne.  Agriculture  and  industry  had  not  had  time  to 
recover  from  the  deadly  blow  which  the  revocation  of  the 
edict  of  Nantes  had  inflicted.  Finally,  the  poverty  of  the 
treasury  was  extreme  after  so  many  wars,  so  many  build- 
ings, expenses  of  all  kinds;  Versailles  alone  had  cost  as 
much  as  ten  campaigns. 

Austria  commenced  hostilities  in  Italy  for  the  conquest  of 
the  Milanais.  Prince  Eugene  defeated  Catinat  at  Carpi 
(1701),  almost  seized  Cremona  by  surprise,  when  he 
captured  Villeroi,  but  was  beaten  at  Luzzara  by  the  Duke 
of  Vendome  (1702).  The  same  year  Villers  gained  his 
marshal's  baton  at  Friedlingen,  and  by  the  victory  of  Hoch- 
stedt  opened  the  road  to  Vienna,  where  the  Elector  of 
Bavaria,  ally  of  the  French,  was  not  resolute  enough  to 
march  (1703).  But  already  Marlborough  had  landed  in  the 
Netherlands,  the  Archduke  Charles  in  Portugal,  the  Duke 
of  Savoy  betrayed  France,  and  the  Camisards*  revolted  in 
the  Cevennes.  The  defeat  of  Tallard  and  Marsin  at  Hoch- 
stedt,f  or  Blenheim,  expelled  the  French  from  Germany 
(1704)  ;  the  defeat  of  Villeroi  at  Ramillies  (May,  1706)  gave 
the  Netherlands  to  the  allies;  that  of  Marsin  at  Turin  (Sep- 
tember, 1706)  enabled  the  Austrians  to  gain  the  Milanais, 
Piedmont,  and  the  following  year  Naples  at  the  other  end 
of  the  peninsula.  Even  Toulon  was  menaced  (1707). 
France,  which  Europe  thought  exhausted,  in  1708  sent  a 


*  These  were  the  Protestants  of  the  Cevennes,  who  took  arms  in  self- 
defense  and  in  defense  of  their  religion  after  the  revocation  of  the  edict  of 
Nantes.  When  about  to  make  a  nocturnal  attack,  for  mutual  recognition 
each  put  his  smock  frock  (caniisd)  outside  his  armor,  whence  the  name 
Camisard. — ED. 

f  This  prodigious  victory,  won  by  Marlborough  and  Eugene,  and  called 
by  the  English  battle  of  Blenheim,  must  be  distinguished  from  the  other 
battle  of  Hochstedt  gained  by  the  French  and  Bavarians  the  preceding 
year  over  the  Imperialists. — ED. 


3<x>  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

magnificent  army  of  100,000  men  to  the  Netherlands  under 
Vendome ;  it  was  routed  at  Oudenarde,  and  Lille  surrendered 
after  the  heroic  resistance  of  Boufflers.  France  was  open ; 
a  band  of  Dutch  penetrated  even  to  Versailles.  At  the  same 
time  Spain  seemed  lost.  The  English  surprised  Gibraltar. 
The  Archduke  Charles  entered  Madrid,  and  in  spite  of  the 
victory  of  Berwick  at  Almanza  (1707)  could  believe  himself 
master  of  the  peninsula. 

To  crown  misfortune,  the  terrible  winter  of  1709  brought 
such  a  famine  that  the  lackeys  of  the  king  begged  at  the 
gates  of  Versailles.  Louis  sued  for  peace.  By  yielding  at 
every  point  he  obtained  the  allies'  disdainful  consent  to 
open  negotiations.  Then  they  demanded  that  he  should 
take  upon  himself  the  expulsion  of  his  grandson  from  Spain. 
"If  fight  I  must,"  he  replied,  "I  will  fight  my  enemies 
rather  than  my  own  children."  He  wrote  a  simple  and 
noble  letter  to  all  the  municipalities,  bishops,  and  intendants. 
After  setting  forth  all  that  he  had  done  to  obtain  peace  he 
stated  the  propositions  of  the  allies.  The  nation  responded 
as  it  ought  to  this  appeal.  Notwithstanding  the  misery  and 
famine,  each  stripped  himself  of  the  little  left  to  send  it  to 
the  public  treasury.  Rich  and  poor,  all  contributed,  and 
Villars  could  open  the  campaign  with  an  army  of  100,000 
men.  This  was  the  patriotic  offering  of  France.  The 
soldiers  were  without  coats,  without  shoes.  As  provisions 
failed,  the  general  had  them  fast  by  turns.  Such  heroism 
deserved  a  victory;  the  day  of  Malplaquet  was  a  defeat 
(September  n,  1709).  Villars  was  grievously  wounded. 
Eugene  and  Marlborough  remained  masters  of  the  battle- 
field;  but  the  French  had  only  8000  dead,  the  allies  20,000, 
and  they  could  undertake  nothing  during  the  whole  cam- 
paign. The  following  year  Vendome  assured  the  throne  of 
Spain  to  Philip  V.  by  the  victory  of  Villaviciosa  (1710). 

Meanwhile  the  Archduke  Charles,  \heprotegJ  of  the  allies, 
became  Emperor  of  Germany  and  master  of  Austria  by  his 
brother's  death  (1711).  England  and  Holland,  who  were 
struggling  to  prevent  a  French  prince  from  reigning  at 
Madrid,  were  no  more  desirous  of  fighting  to  enable  another 
prince  to  rule  at  Madrid,  Naples,  Milan,  Brussels,  Vienna, 
and  in  the  empire.  The  subsidies  furnished  to  the  allies 
by  England  had  increased  its  public  debt  by  ^60,000,000 
sterling.  A  court  intrigue,  to  which  too  mucli  importance 
was  attached,  precipitated  the  event  which  public  opinion, 


CHAP.  XXII.]     COALITIONS  AGAhVST  FRANCE.  361 

sovereign  in  a  free  country,  was  already  preparing  and 
which  the  queen  desired.  The  Duchess  of  Marlborough, 
favorite  of  Anne,  was  supplanted  by  one  of  her  relatives 
whom  she  herself  had  introduced  at  court,  Abigail  Masham, 
as  subservient,  as  shrewd  in  flattering  the  inclinations  of  her 
sovereign,  as  Lady  Marlborough  had  shown  herself  to  be 
brusque  and  disdainful.  A  pair  of  gloves  which  the  haughty 
duchess  neglected  to  pick  up,  a  few  drops  from  a  glass  of 
water  spilled  designedly  upon  Lady  Masham's  dress, 
brought  on  the  explosion.  Lady  Marlborough  received  the 
order  not  to  appear  at  the  castle.  When  Lord  Dartmouth 
announced  the  decision  to  her  she  threw  upon  the  floor  her 
gold  key,  the  insignia  of  her  office,  telling  him  to  do  with 
it  whatever  seemed  good.  Lady  Marlborough,  herself  fallen 
into  disgrace,  dragged  with  her  her  husband's  friends  and 
relatives,  and  shortly  afterward  the  duke  himself.  The 
Tories  accused  him  of  having  appropriated  ^'500,000 
from  the  pay  of  the  army  and  of  having  received  ^80,000 
from  the  contractors.  He  replied  that  it  was  the 
custom,  and  moreover,  that  they  exaggerated  the  matter. 
The  Whig  ministry  was,  nevertheless,  replaced  by  a  ministry 
composed  of  Tories,  and  Marlborough  was  recalled.  Im- 
mediately negotiations  opened  with  France.  We  have  just 
seen  England's  real  reason  for  making  peace ;  the  prelimi- 
naries were  signed  between  the  two  crowns  October  8,  1711. 

This  example  influenced  the  allies,  and  a  congress  opened 
at  Utrecht.  But  the  emperor  was  bent  upon  war.  Prince 
Eugene,  who  had  captured  Quesnoy,  besieged  Landrecies 
with  100,000  men.  His  lines,  which  he  called  the  road  to 
Paris,  were  too  extended.  Villars  profited  by  this  mistake 
to  surprise  Denain  (July,  1712),  and  making  the  most  of  his 
victory,  seized  Marchiennes,  the  depot  of  the  enemies' 
magazines.  He  entered  Douai,  Bouchain,  and  Quesnoy; 
Eugene  was  forced  to  retire  from  France. 

By  sea  the  French  had  experienced  only  disasters.  Their 
navy  being  abandoned,  because  all  their  forces  were  needed 
by  land  to  oppose  Europe,  England  could  without  difficulty 
take  possession  of  the  empire  of  the  seas;  the  French 
colonies,  defenseless,  were  devastated  or  conquered.  How- 
ever, some  of  the  French  corsairs  and  captains  had  gained 
a  glorious  name.  To  Jean  Bart,  who  in  the  last  war  had 
been  the  terror  of  English  commerce,  had  succeeded 
Forbin,  the  former  companion  of  his  adventurous  life;  also 


362  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

the  Bearnese  Ducasse,  Governor  of  St.  Domingo;  Pointis, 
who  took  Carthagena  in  America  and  carried  off  immense 
booty;  Cassart,  who  one  day  with  a  single  vessel  having 
fallen  into  the  midst  of  fifteen  ships  of  the  enemy,  fought 
twelve  hours,  sank  an  English  vessel,  disabled  two,  and  then 
escaped;  lastly,  Duguay-Trouin,  son  of  a  shipowner  of  St. 
Malo,  who  at  eighteen  commanded  a  vessel  of  fourteen 
guns,  and  from  that  day  signalized  each  year  by  bolder 
voyages,  by  more  numerous  captures.  The  time  of  the  great 
war  had  passed  when  Duguay-Trouin  was  called  to  the 
war  navy;  he  received  his  commission  as  captain  in  1706. 
Then  there  were  only  individual  combats  to  sustain,  con- 
voys to  capture,  hostile  coasts  to  ravage.  Duguay-Trouin 
carried  on  this  sort  of  war  as  Jean  Bart  had  done  ten 
years  before.  His  most  brilliant  exploit  was  the  seizure  of 
Rio  Janeiro,  where  he  inflicted  upon  the  enemy  losses 
amounting  to  more  than  25,000,000  francs  (1711).  But 
the  isolated  exploits  of  these  hardy  mariners  could  have  no 
influence  upon  the  fate  of  war. 

The  victory  of  Denain  fortunately  hastened  the  conclu- 
sion of  peace.  England,  Portugal,  Savoy,  Prussia,  and 
Holland  signed  the  treaties  of  Utrecht  (May  4,  1713). 
France  recognized  the  order  of  succession  established  in 
England  by  the  revolution  of  1688,  ceded  the  island  of 
Newfoundland,  Hudson's  Bay,  and  Acadia,  and  pledged 
herself  to  demolish  the  fortifications  of  Dunkirk,  the  home 
of  Jean  Bart.  Spain  left  the  English  in  possession  of 
Gibraltar  and  Minorca.  Moreover,  it  was  stipulated  that 
the  crowns  of  France  and  Spain  should  never  be  united. 
Let  us  add  that  Louis  XIV.  had  to  agree  to  the  release 
from  prison  of  such  among  his  subjects  as  were  confined 
there  on  account  of  religion.  Holland  obtained  the  right 
of  placing  garrisons  in  most  of  the  strongholds  in  the  Spanish 
Netherlands,  to  serve  as  a  barrier  against  France.  The 
Duke  of  Savoy  received  Sicily  with  the  title  of  king;  the 
King  of  Prussia,  recognized  under  that  title  by  France, 
obtained  Guelders.  The  emperor,  left  alone,  continued  the 
war;  but  Villars  seized  Landau  and  Freiburg;  then  Charles 
VI.  signed  the  treaty  of  Rastadt  (1714),  whereby  he 
obtained  what  the  treaty  of  Utrecht  had  reserved  him,  the 
Netherlands,  Naples,  Sardinia,  the  Milanais,  and  part  of 
Tuscany.  The  Elector  of  Bavaria,  the  unhappy  ally  of 
France,  was  re-established  in  his  states. 


CHAP.  XXII.]     COALITIONS  AGAINST  FRANCE.  363 

Two  powers  especially  had  gained  in  this  war:  Austria, 
magnificent  dominions  in  Italy  and  the  Netherlands; 
England,  the  empire  of  the  ocean,  which  she  had  seized. 
Besides,  the  one  had  recovered  Hungary,  more  necessary 
to  her  than  Italy ;  the  other  remained  at  Port  Mahon, 
whence  she  could  hold  Toulon  in  check,  and  at  Gibraltar, 
whence  she  menaced  Spain  and  guarded  the  entrance  of  the 
Mediterranean.  But  when  the  Spaniards  bade  farewell  to 
the  Netherlands  they  had  no  permanent  cause  for  war 
against  the  French,  and  after  having  been  their  enemies  for 
two  centuries  could  now  become  forever  their  allies. 

Louis  XIV.  scarcely  survived  the  treaty  of  Rastadt. 
The  last  years  of  his  reign  had  been  as  sad  as  the  earlier  had 
been  brilliant.  To  national  misfortunes  cruel  domestic 
afflictions  were  added ;  he  had  lost  his  only  son,  the  grand 
dauphin  (April  14,  1711);  his  grandson,  the  dauphin,  the 
Duke  of  Burgundy  (February  18,  1712),  and  the  Duchess 
of  Burgundy  (February  12,  1712);  their  elder  son,  the 
Duke  of  Brittany  (March  8);  the  Duke  of  Bern',  son  of  the 
grand  dauphin  (1714).  Of  his  numerous  family  there 
remained  to  Louis  only  his  grandson,  Philip  V.,  King  of 
Spain,  and  his  great-grandson,  the  Duke  of  Anjou,  then 
five  years  old,  who  became  Louis  XV.  So  many  losses  in 
rapid  succession  decided  the  king  to  take  a  step  whereby 
public  morality  was  outraged;  his  sons,  the  Duke  of  Maine 
and  the  Count  of  Toulouse,  children  of  the  Marchioness  of 
Montespan,  already  legitimatized,  were  declared  heirs  of  the 
crown  through  default  of  princes  of  the  blood.  By  his  will  he 
summoned  them  to  take  part  in  the  council  of  the  regency, 
of  which  the  Duke  of  Orleans,  his  nephew,  had  only  the 
presidency.  Moreover,  the  Duke  of  Maine  was  appointed 
guardian  of  the  young  king  as  well  as  superintendent  of  his 
education. 

About  the  middle  of  August,  1715,  on  his  return  from 
Marly,  Louis  XIV.  was  attacked  by  the  malady  which  ter- 
minated his  life.  His  legs  swelled;  gangrene  set  in.  Lord 
Stair,  the  English  ambassador,  wagered  that  the  king  would 
not  live  through  September.  The  Duke  of  Orleans,  who 
during  the  last  excursion  to  Marly  had  been  left  absolutely 
alone,  was  then  surrounded  by  the  entire  court.  During 
the  last  days  of  the  king's  illness  a  quack  gave  him  an 
elixir  which  revived  his  strength.  He  ate,  and  the  quack 
assured  him  that  he  would  recover.  The  crowd  which  sur- 


364  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE. 

rounded  the  Duke  of  Orleans  diminished  immediately.  "If 
the  king  eats  a  second  time,"  said  the  duke,  "we  shall  have 
nobody."  But  the  disease  was  mortal.  "I  had  thought," 
said  Louis  to  Mme.  de  Maintenon,  "that  it  was  more  diffi- 
cult to  die;"  and  to  his  domestics:  "Why  do  you  weep? 
Did  you  think  me  immortal?"  He  calmly  gave  his  orders 
about  many  things,  even  about  his  funeral  rites.  He  avowed 
a  few  of  his  mistakes,  and  urged  the  child  who  was  to  be 
king  to  care  less  than  he  had  done  for  war  and  extravagant 
expenses.  In  fact  he  left  France  utterly  exhausted.  The 
state  was  ruined,  and  apparently  had  no  other  resource  than 
bankruptcy.  Before  the  war  of  the  succession  Vauban  had 
already  written:  "Nearly  one-tenth  of  the  people  are 
reduced  to  beggary;  of  the  other  nine,  five  cannot  give 
alms  to  the  tenth,  from  whose  condition  they  do  not  differ; 
three  are  in  very  straitened  circumstances;  the  remaining 
tenth  does  not  comprise  more  than  100,000  families,  of 
whom  not  10,000  are  in  affluence."  What  was  the  condi- 
tion, therefore,  in  1715  after  that  terrible  war  when  it  was 
necessary  to  borrow  at  the  rate  of  400  for  100,  to  create 
new  taxes,  to  consume  two  years'  revenues  in  advance,  and 
to  raise  the  public  debt  to  the  amount  of  2,400,000,000 
francs,  in  money  of  to-day  three  times  as  much? 

The  acquisition  of  two  provinces,  Flanders  and  Franche- 
Comte,  and  of  a  few  cities,  as  Strasburg,  Landau,  and 
Dunkirk,  was  a  small  compensation  for  such  frightful 
misery.  When  we  remember  the  state  of  Europe  in  1661 
we  must  realize  that  on  the  whole  Louis  XIV.  did  not  reap 
all  the  advantages  the  situation  offered  France.  But  chil- 
dren speedily  forget  their  fathers'  sufferings;  succeeding 
generations  were  content  to  recall  only  so  many  victories, 
Europe  defied,  France  dominant  during  twenty  years; 
finally,  the  incomparable  eclat  of  the  court  of  Versailles,  and 
those  artistic  and  literary  marvels  which  have  caused  the 
seventeenth  century  to  be  called  the  age  of  Louis  XIV. 


CHAPTER   XXIII. 

ARTS,  LETTERS,  AND  SCIENCES  IN  THE  SEVENTEENTH 
CENTURY. 


Letters  and  Arts  in  France. — Letters  and  Arts  in  Foreign  Countries. — 
The  Sciences  in  the  Seventeenth  Century. 


THE  sixteenth  century  had  accomplished  the  religious 
reformation;  the  eighteenth  was  to  bring  about  political 

reforms.  Placed  between  those  two  revolu- 
artsetinerFranced  tionary  eras  the  seventeenth  possessed  in 

letters  so  complete  an  equilibrium  of  intellec- 
tual forces,  a  power  of  expression  so  equal  to  its  power  of 
thought,  that  it  remains  more  than  any  other  the  literary 
century  of  France.  Generations  living  in  eventful  days,  in 
the  midst  of  burning  discussions,  behold  loftier  heights  and 
profounder  depths,  but  do  not  attain  that  calm  and  serene 
beauty  in  the  contemplation  of  which  posterity  never 
wearies. 

Louis  XIV.  did  not  consider  that  literature  was  a  power, 
and  in  his  time  it  had  not  yet  become  such ;  he  regarded 
it  as  at  least  a  necessary  ornament,  as  a  luxury  worthy  of 
a  great  king.  Therefore  he  favored  letters,  yet  all  the  while 
subjecting  them  to  discipline,  and  under  him  there  existed 
a  real  government  of  literature.  Colbert  was  its  minister. 
We  have  already  seen  how  he  attempted  its  organization  by 
founding  its  academies,  noble  asylums  of  intellect  and 
knowledge,  which  were  to  outline  its  rules,  to  give  its  tone, 
and,  if  I  may  so  speak,  to  mark  its  measure.  But  let  us  not 
forget  that  the  age  of  Louis  XIV.  had  begun  long  before  the 
king  could  exert  any  influence  upon  letters.  France  before 
Louis  took  the  government  in  his  hands  had  already 
reached  half  the  literary  glory  which  the  sixteenth  century 
was  reserving  her.  Corneille,  Descartes,  Pascal,  had  pro- 
duced their  masterpieces ;  Mme.  de  Sevigne,  La  Rochefou- 

365 


366  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BouK  V. 

cauld,  Moliere,  La  Fontaine,  Bossuet,  were  in  full  possession 
of  their  talent;  finally,  the  two  greatest  painters  of  the 
century,  Le  Sueur  and  Poussin,  were  dead  or  about  to  die, 
and  Boileau  had  just  written  his  first  satire.  This  reser- 
vation granted,  let  the  greatest  writer  of  the  eighteenth 
century  judge  his  predecessors  of  the  seventeenth. 

"In  eloquence,  in  poetry,  in  literature,  in  books  of  ethics 
and  diversion,  the  French  were  the  legislators  of  Europe. 
Real  eloquence  was  everywhere  unknown,  religion  was 
ridiculously  taught  in  the  pulpit,  and  in  the  same  manner 
causes  were  pleaded  at  the  bar.  The  preachers  cited  Virgil 
and  Ovid;  the  lawyers,  St.  Augustine  and  St.  Jerome.  Not 
yet  had  there  been  found  a  genius  who  could  bestow  upon 
the  French  language  vein,  number,  propriety  of  style,  and 
dignity.  A  few  verses  only  of  Malherbe  made  one  feel  of 
what  grandeur  and  force  it  was  capable;  but  that  was  all. 
Those  very  geniuses  who  had  written  admirably  in  Latin,  as 
President  de  Thou  and  the  Chancellor  de  1'Hopital,  were 
not  the  same  men  when  dealing  with  their  o\vn  language, 
rebellious  in  their  hands.  The  French  so  far  were  com- 
mendable only  for  a  peculiar  ingenuousness  which  had  con- 
stituted the  merit  of  Joinville,  Amyot,  Marot,  Montaigne, 
Regnier,  and  of  the  'Satire  Menippee.'*  John  de  Lin- 
gendes,  Bishop  of  Macon,  was  the  first  orator  who  spoke  in 
the  grand  style.  The  funeral  discourse  of  Victor  Amadeus, 
which  he  pronounced  in  1637,  was  full  of  so  masterly  flights 
of  eloqence  that  Flechier  long  after  borrowed  the  entire 
exordium  to  ornament  his  famous  funeral  oration  upon  the 
Viscount  de  Turenne. 

"Balzac  (1594-1654)  meanwhile  gave  number  and  har- 
mony to  prose.  It  is  true  that  his  letters  were  inflated 
harangues,  but  rhetoric  has  so  much  power  over  men 
that  Balzac  is  admired  for  having  discovered  that  small 

*  So  called  from  the  satirist  and  cynic  Menippus  of  Coele-Syria,  who 
nourished  in  the  first  century  B.C.  The  "  Satire  Menippee  "  was  the  joint 
production  of  seven  peaceful  but  intelligent  and  patriotic  burgesses.  Its 
object  was  to  satirize  the  party  of  the  league,  who  were  the  irreconcilable 
enemies  of  Henry  IV.  and  of  order,  and  to  restore  peace  and  union  to 
France  by  the  triumph  of  the  monarchy.  Satirical  almost  to  the  end,  it 
there  varied  its  tune  and  concluded  by  a  sublime  address  pronounced  by 
the  representative  of  the  third  estate,  or  the  people.  Few  literary  com- 
positions have  ever  been  equally  effective.  It  has  been  said  that  Henry 
IV.  owed  his  final  success  no  less  to  the  "  Satire  Menippee  "  than  to  his 
victory  of  Ivry. — ED. 


CHAP.  XXIII.]     ARTS,  LETTERS,  AND  SCIENCES.  367 

artistic  detail,  ignored  but  necessary,  which  consists  in  the 
harmonious  choice  of  words.  He  is  praised  even  for 
having  employed  it  often  out  of  its  place. 

"One  of  the  works  which  most  contributed  to  form 
national  taste  was  the  unpretending  collection  of  maxims  of 
Francis,  Duke  de  la  Rochefoucauld  (1613-80).  Although 
there  is  only  one  thought  in  the  book,  which  is  that  "self- 
love  is  the  mainspring  of  everything,"  yet  this  thought  is 
presented  under  so  many  varied  aspects  that  it  is  almost 
always  pointed.  It  is  not  so  much  a  book  as  material  to 
ornament  a  book.  One  reads  this  little  collection  eagerly; 
it  accustoms  one  to  think  and  to  clothe  his  thoughts  in 
lively,  precise,  and  delicate  form. 

"But  the  first  book  of  genius  which  appeared  in  prose 
was  the  collection  of  'Provincial  Letters'  in  1657.  All  kinds 
of  eloquence  are  contained  in  it.  There  is  not  a  single 
word  in  it  which  after  the  lapse  of  a  hundred  years  is  affected 
by  the  change,  so  often  modifying  living  language.  By  this 
work  must  be  indicated  the  epoch  when  the  language 
became  fixed.  The  Bishop  of  Lucon,  son  of  the  celebrated 
Bussy,  told  me  once  that  having  asked  the  Bishop  of  Meaux 
of  what  work  he  would  have  preferred  to  be  the  author  if  he 
had  not  composed  his  own,  Bossuet  replied  to  him,  'The 
Provincial  Letters.' 

"One  of  the  first  who  displayed  in  the  pulpit  an  al- 
ways eloquent  logic  was  Father  Bourdaloue  (1632-1704), 
toward  the  year  1668.  He  was  a  new  light.  After  him 
there  were  other  pulpit  orators,  as  Father  Massillon  (1662- 
1742),  Bishop  of  Clermont,  who  diffused  through  their  dis- 
courses more  numerous  graces,  more  subtle  and  more  pene- 
trating pictures  of  the  manners  of  the  time;  but  none  caused 
him  to  be  forgotten. 

"He  had  been  preceded  by  Bossuet,  then  Bishop  of 
Meaux.  The  latter,  who  became  so  illustrious  a  man,  had 
preached  in  his  youth  before  the  king  and  the  queen  mother 
in  1661,  years  before  Father  Bourdaloue  was  known.  His 
discourses,  sustained  by  a  noble  and  moving  action,  the 
first  which  the  court  had  heard  bordering  upon  the  sublime, 
had  so  great  a  success  that  the  king  sent  a  letter  in  his  own 
name  to  his  father,  congratulating  him  on  the  possession  of 
such  a  son.  However,  when  Bourdaloue  appeared  Bossuet 
was  no  longer  considered  the  chief  preacher.  He  had  already 
devoted  himself  to  funeral  discourses,  a  sort  of  eloquence 


368  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BooK  V. 

which  demands  imagination  and  a  majestic  grandeur  akin 
to  poetry.  His  funeral  discourse  upon  the  queen  mother, 
which  he  pronounced  in  1667,  though  it  procured  him  the 
bishopric  of  Condom  was  not  worthy  of  him.  The  funeral 
eulogy  of  the  Queen  of  England,  widow  of  Charles  I.,  which 
he  delivered  in  1669,  was  a  masterpiece  almost  through- 
out. The  funeral  eulogy  of  Madame,*  torn  away  in  the 
flower  of  her  age  and  dead  in  his  arms,  obtained  the  great- 
est and  the  rarest  of  successes,  that  of  wringing  tears  from 
the  eyes  of  the  court.  He  was  obliged  to  stop  after  those 
words  'Oh,  disastrous  night,  appalling  night,  when  suddenly 
resounded  as  a  burst  of  thunder  that  overwhelming  tidings, 
Madame  is  dying!  Madame  is  dead!'  The  audience 
burst  into  sobs,  and  the  voice  of  the  orator  was  interrupted 
by  their  sighs  and  tears. 

"The  French  alone  have  succeeded  in  this  kind  of  elo- 
quence. The  same  man  some  time  after  originated  another 
in  which  small  success  was  possible  save  in  his  hands.  He 
applied  the  oratorical  art  even  to  history,  from  which  it 
would  seem  excluded.  His  'Discourse  upon  Universal 
History'  has  had  neither  models  nor  imitators.  Mankind 
was  astonished  at  that  majestic  force  with  which  he 
described  the  manners,  the  government,  the  growth  and  the 
fall  of  empires,  and  at  those  rapid  flights  of  energetic  truth 
with  which  he  painted  and  judged  the  nations. 

"Almost  all  the  works  which  did  honor  to  that  century 
were  in  a  style  unknown  to  antiquity.  '  Telemaque'  is  of  the 
number.  Fenelon  (1651-1715),  the  disciple,  the  friend  of 
Bossuet,  who  afterward  became  in  spite  of  himself  his  rival 
and  enemy,  composed  that  peculiar  book  which  partakes  at 
once  of  the  romance  and  the  poem,  and  which  substituted 
modulated  prose  for  versification.  It  seems  that  he  wished 
to  treat  romance  as  the  Bishop  of  Meaux  had  treated  history 
by  giving  it  dignity  and  unknown  charms,  and  especially  by 
drawing  from  those  fictions  a  moral  useful  to  the  human 

*  "  Madame  "  was  the  title  given  under  the  ancient  monarchy  to  the 
wife  of  the  French  king's  oldest  brother.  It  was  also  sometimes  applied 
to  all  the  royal  princesses.  Here  it  denotes  Henrietta  Anne  of  England, 
daughter  of  Charles  I.  and  of  Henrietta  Maria,  and  wife  of  the  Duke  of 
Orleans,  brother  of  Louis  XIV.  She  died  in  1670  at  the  age  of  twenty- 
six.  In  the  same  way  "  Monsieur"  was  the  common  title  of  the  king's 
eldest  brother.  The  most  famous  "  Monsieur"  was  Philippe,  Duke  of 
Orleans,  brother  of  Louis  XIV.,  husband  of  "  Madame "  and  direct 
ancestor — great-great-great-grandfather — of  King  Louis  Philippe. — ED. 


CHAP.  XXIII.]     ARTS,  LETTERS,  AND  SCIENCES.  369 

race.  He  had  composed  this  book  to  serve  as  topics  and 
instruction  to  the  Duke  of  Burgundy,  whose  tutor  he  was. 
Full  of  the  lore  of  the  ancients  and  endowed  with  a  lively 
and  tender  imagination,  he  had  created  a  style  which  was 
all  his  own,  and  which  flowed  in  natural  abundance.  It 
was  believed  that  in 'Telemaque'  an  indirect  criticism  of  the 
government  of  Louis  XIV.  was  intended,  and  from  that 
moment  Fenelon  was  lost  at  the  court. 

"Among  productions  of  a  unique  order  may  be  reckoned 
the  'Characters'  of  La  Bruyere  (1644-96).  Such  a  work 
was  as  unexampled  among  the  ancients  as  was  Tele- 
maque.'  A  rapid,  concise,  and  nervous  style,  picturesque 
expression,  and  an  entirely  new  use  of  language,  though  one 
not  violating  the  rules,  impressed  the  public,  while  its  count- 
less allusions  made  certain  its  success." 

There  is  one  class  of  writers  apart  who  narrate  what  they 
have  done  and  what  they  have  seen.  Thanks  perhaps  to 
an  eccentricity  of  the  national  French  mind,  to  the  desire 
of  interesting  in  one's  self  not  only  contemporaries  but  even 
posterity,  and  of  dictating  opinions  to  the  latter,  France  is 
the  country  possessing  the  most  numerous  memoirs.  This 
curious  branch  of  historical  literature  commenced  at  an  early 
date  among  the  French  with  Villehardouin  and  Joinville. 
The  seventeenth  century  has  a  rich  collection  due  to  certain 
authors,  most  of  whom  possessed  a  keen  and  delicate  intel- 
lect, and  who  have  revealed  to  us  many  of  the  secrets  and 
the  causes  of  many  things.  Those  of  Richelieu  are  a 
precious  mine  for  the  great  history  of  the  age;  those  of 
Mme.  de  Motteville  (1621-89),  the  confidante  of  Anne  of 
Austria,  make  us  live  in  intimacy  with  that  princess.  The 
Abbe  de  Choisy  (1644-1724),  whose  life  was  adventurous  and 
not  always  free  from  reproach,  drew  up  "Memoirs  to  Serve 
in  the  History  of  Louis  XIV."  Paul  de  Gondi,  Cardinal  de 
Retz  (1614-79),  teft  a  book  which  is  one  of  the  monuments 
of  the  French  language,  and  which  is  always  read  with  pleas- 
ure even  when  one  does  not  fully  credit  the  author.  Gour- 
ville  (1625-1703),  receiver  general  of  the  villain  taxes  of 
Guyenne,  whom  immense  riches  rapidly  acquired  involved 
in  the  disgrace  of  Fouquet,  wrote  his  "Souvenirs  of  the 
Years  1642-78";  Pierre  Lenet,  counselor  at  the  parliament 
of  Dijon,  devoted  his  to  the  wars  of  the  Fronde.  In  this 
kind  of  literature  the  great  lords  voluntarily  became 
authors.  We  have  upon  the  regency  of  Anne  of  Austria 


37°  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

the  "Memoirs"  of  the  Duke  de  la  Rochefoucauld,  which  on 
their  appearance  caused  more  than  one  scandal;  and  upon 
the  last  part  of  the  reign  of  Louis  XIV.  and  the  commence- 
ment of  that  of  Louis  XV.  the  forty  volumes  of  the  duke 
and  peer  Rouvroy  de  St.  Simon,  whom  it  was  foolish  to 
compare  with  Tacitus,  but  who  was  none  the  less  often  a 
powerful  writer. 

As  to  the  poets,  Regnier  and'  Malherbe  belong  to  the 
preceding  century,  although  the  one  died  in  1613  and  the 
other  in  1628.  Rotrou  is  entirely  of  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury (1609-50),  but  hardly  any  one  of  his  works  is  read 
expect  his  tragedy  of  "\Venceslas."  With  Corneille  the 
masterpieces  at  length  appeared  and  crowded  against  each 
other  on  the  French  stage,  which  was  raised  by  him  to  the 
height  of  the  Greek  theater. 

"Pierre  Corneille  (1606-84)  is  still  more  to  be  admired,  in- 
asmuch as  he  was  surrounded  by  exceedingly  poor  models 
when  he  began  to  present  his  tragedies.  The  fact  that  these 
poor  models  were  highly  esteemed  would  naturally  prevent 
his  literary  progress;  that  they  were  favored  by  Cardinal 
Richelieu,  the  protector  of  literary  men  but  not  of  good 
taste,  would  complete  his  discouragement.  Corneille  had 
to  contend  against  his  century,  his  rivals,  and  the  cardinal, 
who  wished  to  depreciate  'The  Cid,'  and  who  disapproved 
of 'Polyeucte.'  Corneille  created  himself ;  but  Louis  XIV., 
Colbert,  Sophocles,  and  Euripides  all  contributed  to  form 
Racine  (1639-99).  An  ode  which  he  composed  at  the 
age  of  twenty  for  the  marriage  of  the  king  obtained  for  him 
a  present  which  he  did  not  expect  and  determined  his  after 
career.  His  reputation  has  daily  increased,  while  that  of 
Corneille  has  slightly  diminished.  The  reason  is  that  Racine 
in  all  his  works  subsequent  to  his  'Alexander'  is  always 
elegant,  always  correct,  always  true,  that  he  always  speaks 
to  the  heart,  while  Corneille  is  often  deficient  in  all  these 
qualities.  Racine  far  surpassed  both  the  Greeks  and 
Corneille  in  comprehension  of  the  passions,  and  he  carried 
the  sweet  harmonies  of  poetry  as  well  as  the  graces  of 
speech  to  the  highest  point  attainable. 

"A  numerous  party  always  plumed  themselves  on  not 
doing  him  justice.  Mine,  de  Sevigne  (1626-96),  the  fore- 
most person  of  her  century  in  epistolary  style,  and  especially 
in  narrating  bagatelles  with  grace,  always  believed  that 
'Racine  would  not  go  far.'  She  judged  him  as  she  did 


CHAP.  XXIII.]    ARTS,  LETTERS,  AND  SCIENCES.  371 

coffee, 'of  which,' she  said,  'they  will  soon  become  tired.' 
Time  is  necessary  for  reputations  to  mature. 

"The  surprising  destiny  of  that  century  vouchsafed 
Moliere  (1622-73)  as  contemporary  of  Corneille  and  Racine. 
It  is  not  true  that  Moliere  when  he  appeared  found  the 
theater  absolutely  destitute  of  good  comedies.  Corneille 
himself  had  composed  'The  Liar' ;  and  Moliere  had  not  yet 
presented  more  than  two  of  his  masterpieces  when  the  public 
were  enjoying  'The  Coquettish  Mother'  of  Quinault,  a 
piece  so  rich  in  character  and  plot  as  to  be  a  model  of 
intrigue.  It  dates  from  1664:  it  is  the  first  comedy  wherein 
are  depicted  those  people  afterward  dubbed  'the  grand 
personages.'  The  most  of  the  great  lords  in  the  court  of 
Louis  XIV.  wished  to  imitate  that  air  of  grandeur,  of  pomp 
and  dignity,  which  characterized  their  master.  Those  of  an 
inferior  class  copied  the  haughtiness  of  their  superiors;  and 
there  were  some,  in  fine,  who  pushed  this  important  manner 
and  this  dominant  desire  of  proclaiming  their  worth  to  the 
most  ridiculous  excess.  This  fault  lasted  long.  Moliere 
often  attacked  it ;  and  he  contributed  to  rid  the  public  of 
such  ostentatious  subalterns,  as  well  as  of  the  affectation  of 
pretentious  females,  of  the  pedantry  of  learned  women,  and 
of  the  robe  and  the  Latin  of  the  physicians.  Moliere  was, 
if  I  may  so  speak,  a  legislator  of  the  proprieties  of  society. 
I  am  referring  here  only  to  this  one  service  rendered  to  his 
age.  His  other  merits  are  sufficiently  known. 

"That  was  a  period  deserving  the  attention  of  future 
times,  when  the  heroes  of  Corneille  and  Racine,  the  charac- 
ters of  Moliere,  the  symphonies  of  Lulli,  all  new  to  the 
nation,  and — since  I  am  speaking  here  only  of  the  artifi- 
cial— the  tones  of  Bossuet  and  Bourdaloue,  commanded  the 
attention  of  Louis  XIV.,  of  Madame,  so  celebrated  for  her 
taste,  of  Conde,  of  Turenne,  of  Colbert,  and  of  that  multi- 
tude of  superior  men  who  appeared  in  every  department  of 
genius.  The  age  has  not  since  been  repeated  when  a  Duke 
de  la  Rochefoucauld,  author  of  the  'Maxims,'  on  concluding 
a  conversation  with  a  Pascal  and  an  Arnauld  went  to  the 
theater  of  a  Corneille. 

"Despreaux  (1636-1711)  raised  himself  to  the  level  of  so 
many  great  men,  not  indeed  by  his  early  satires,  for  the 
gaze  of  posterity  will  not  linger  upon  the  'Perplexities  of 
Paris'  and  upon  the  names  of  Cassagne  and  Cotin,  but  he 
gave  instruction  to  that  same  posterity  by  his  beautiful 


37 2  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

epistles,  and  especially  by  his  'Poetic  Art,'   in  which  Cor- 
neille  would  have  found  much  to  learn. 

"La  Fontaine  (1621-95),  much  less  chastened  in  style 
and  much  less  correct  in  language,  but  unique  in  his  naivete" 
and  in  the  graces  which  are  peculiar  to  him,  placed  himself, 
by  the  simplest  things,  almost  at  the  side  of  those  sublime 
men. 

"There  have  arisen  few  great  geniuses  since  the  fair  days 
of  those  illustrious  writers;  and  almost  at  the  time  when 
Louis  XIV.  died  exhausted  nature  seemed  to  rest." 

Philosophy  had  just  been  renewed  by  Descartes,  less  by 
what  he  had  built  up  than  by  what  he  had  destroyed.  His 
system  has  fallen,  as  necessarily  fall  all  philosophic  sys- 
tems ;  his  method  still  endures,  the  most  formidable  weapon 
to  overthrow  error,  the  most  powerful  to  discover  truth. 
Descartes  in  moral  and  physical  sciences  accepted  only 
what  seemed  evident  to  reason,  and  this  evidence  he  located 
in  the  irresistible  authority  of  the  testimony  of  conscious- 
ness.* Thus  in  his  "Discourse  upon  Method"  (1637),  written 
in  that  pure,  transparent  style  which  became  one  of  the 
characteristics  of  French  prose  in  the  seventeenth  century, 
and  in  his  "Meditations"  (1641),  he  wished  to  demon- 
strate by  the  aid  of  reason  alone  the  existence  of  God,  the 
spirituality  and  the  immortality  of  the  soul,  the  freedom  and 
consequently  the  responsibility  of  man.  His  principles 
were  adopted  by  the  most  religious  minds  of  the  seventeenth 
century.  They  inspired  in  Father  Malebranche  of  the  Ora- 
tory his  admirable  work  "Search  after  Truth"  ;  in  Bossuet, 
his  "Treatise  upon  Knowledge  of  God  and  Self";  in 
Fenelon,  the  eloquent  "Demonstration  of  the  Existence 
of  God."  Gassendi,  on  the  contrary,  was  the  obstinate 

*  In  the  "  Studi  Filosofici"  (Milan,  1861)  of  Ansonia  Franche,  one  of  the 
most  distinguished  men  of  contemporaneous  Italy,  is  the  following  pas- 
sage :  "  The  doctrine  of  Descartes  has  been  unable  to  escape  the  ordinary 
fate  of  metaphysical  systems.  His  method,  on  the  contrary,  has  become 
the  essential  condition  of  philosophical  progress.  It  indicates  three 
phases  :  preparatory  doubt,  which  frees  the  mind  from  its  prejudices 
and  errors  ;  analysis  of  consciousness,  to  determine  the  object,  the  value, 
and  the  limits  of  the  knowledge  ;  evidence  of  the  thought,  to  serve  as  a 
supreme  criterion  of  truth  and  certainty.  In  these  simple  principles  of 
method  was  contained  the  vastest  and  the  most  profound  philosophical 
reform  which  the  world  has  witnessed  since  the  death  of  Socrates." 
M.  de  Remusat  in  his  biography  of  the  chancellor  says :  "Bacon  is  at 
heart  only  a  critic,  Descartes  is  a  creator." 


CHAP.  XXIII.]     ARTS,  LETTERS,  AND  SCIENCES.  373 

adversary  of  Descartes,  whose  system  of  innate  ideas  he 
combated  in  order  to  substitute  that  of  ideas  deriving  their 
origin  from  sensation. 

Pascal  (1623-62),  another  powerful  intellect,  was  also  a 
great  writer,  in  his  "Provincial  Letters"  (1656),  against  the 
lax  morality  of  the  Jesuits,  and  in  his  "Thoughts,"  frag- 
ments of  a  work  which  he  wished  to  compose  upon  the 
truth  of  Christianity.  Farther  on  we  shall  see  what  he  and 
Descartes  did  for  the  sciences.  Despite  his  discoveries 
Pascal  is  not  so  much  an  inventive  genius  like  Descartes  as 
a  critical  genius  of  the  most  formidable  power. 

Around  Pascal  cluster  his  friends,  the  pious  solitaries  of 
Port  Royal,  men  of  keen  intellect  although  somewhat  nar- 
row, who  founded  in  the  heart  of  Catholicism  and  of  the 
Gallican  Church  an  energetic  and  long-lived  sect,  which  was 
persecuted  by  Louis  XIV.,  and  which  in  the  broad  seven- 
teenth century  revived  theological  quarrels.  The  principal 
doctors  of  Jansenism  were  Le  Maistre  de  Sacy  (1612-94), 
who  translated  the  Bible  in  the  Bastille,  where  the  Jesuits 
kept  him  confined  three  years;  Antoine  Arnauld  (1612-94), 
called  the  great  Arnauld,  whose  life  was  spent  in  ceaseless 
theological  controversy  with  the  Jesuits,  with  the  Protes- 
tants and  Malebranche;  Nicole  (1625-95),  specially  known 
for  his  "Moral  Essays";  and  Lancelot,  by  his  educational 
works.  Far  from  this  current  of  ideas  Bayle  and  La  Mothe 
le  Vayer  continued  the  skeptical  interpretation  of  Rabelais 
and  Montaigne  which  Voltaire  was  to  resume. 

We  must  pay  a  tribute  to  French  erudition,  to  those  labori- 
ous minds  who  continued  to  reveal  antiquity  or  who 
endeavored  to  throw  light  upon  the  chaos  of  the  national 
origin.  Their  impress  upon  their  language  was  little  or 
nothing,  for  ordinarily  they  were  not  writers,  and  many 
of  their  works  are  in  Latin,  but  their  influence  was  great 
upon  ideas,  inasmuch  as  the  past  better  comprehended  gives 
light  to  the  present;  finally,  they  sought  one  line  of  truths, 
those  of  history,  and  their  labors  guide  us  still.  The 
greatest  of  these  learned  men  were  Casaubon,  Scaliger, 
Saumaise,  du  Cange,  Baluze,  and  many  Benedictines  of 
St.  Maur. 

Everything  is  comprised  in  the  intellectual  development 
of  a  people ;  when  the  time  of  the  great  writers  has  come 
that  of  the  great  artists  is  not  far  away.  That  sort  of  intel- 
lectual contagion  which  takes  possession  of  all  chosen  spirits 


374  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

and  arouses  superior  talents  was  too  active  in  the  seven- 
teenth century  for  the  artists  to  be  absent  from  the  gather- 
ing of  learned  men  and  poets. 

There  were  then  four  painters  of  the  first  rank,  Poussin, 
Le  Sueur,  Claude  Lorraine,  and  Le  Brun;  an  admirable 
sculptor,  Puget;  talented  architects,  Mansart  and  Perrault ; 
finally,  a  skilled  musician,  Lulli. 

Poussin  lived  long  at  Rome  and  enjoyed  the  reputation 
of  being  the  foremost  painter  of  his  time ;  this  reputation  he 
has  retained.  Despite  his  too  somber  coloring  he  remains 
the  chief  of  the  French  school  in  moral  elevation,  dramatic 
interest,  richness  and  poetry  of  composition,  and  moreover, 
in  that  pursuit  of  the  ideal  which  he  himself  called  the  "lofty 
delight  of  intelligence."  Let  us  also  add,  for  it  is  by  no 
means  foreign  to  art,  he  is  chief  in  the  dignity  of  his  life. 
He  despised  fortune,  honors,  and  intimacy  with  the  great, 
shutting  himself  up  with  his  noble  thoughts  and  with  his  art; 
just  as  he  placed  his  Diogenes  in  the  midst  of  the  most 
splendid  scenes,  and  represented  the  philosopher  rejecting 
disdainfully  what  he  deemed  really  useless.  Le  Sueur, 
Le  Brun,  and  Mignard  can  be  considered  his  pupils,  for  they 
long  received  his  lessons  or  his  advice.  Poussin  was  from 
Les  Andelys  in  Normandy,  and  died  at  the  age  of  seventy- 
two  (1665).  Le  Sueur  was  born  at  Paris,  lived  poor  in 
obscurity,  and  died  in  1655  at  the  age  of  thirty-eight. 
He  painted  for  the  convent  of  the  Carthusians  a  beautiful 
series  of  twenty-two  pictures  representing  the  life  of  St. 
Bruno.  His  was  a  gentle  and  candid  soul;  his  paintings, 
always  graceful  even  when  representing  the  most  austere 
subjects,  by  the  sweetness  of  their  tone  and  the  delicacy  of 
his  touch  admirably  express  the  sentiments  and  even  the 
most  intimate  affections  of  his  characters.  The  very  oppo- 
site was  his  rival  Le  Brun,  born  also  at  Paris  two  years  later 
(1619),  whose  too  theatrical  talent  better  suited  Louis  XIV. 
The  monarch  appointed  him  his  chief  painter,  and  intrusted 
him  with  the  decoration  of  the  grand  gallery  at  Versailles ;  to 
it  he  devoted  fourteen  years.  Till  the  death  of  Colbert  he 
was  the  arbiter,  the  director  of  the  arts  in  France ;  nothing 
was  done  except  in  accordance  with  his  designs  and  after 
his  advice;  his  influence,  and  often  his  hand,  is  found  in  all 
the  works  of  that  age  His  drawing  is  nerveless  and  heavy; 
the  expression  of  his  figures  is  exaggerated  rather  than  true; 
he  did  not  possess  the  gorgeous  coloring  of  Titian  nor  the 


CHAP.  XXIII.]     ARTS,  LETTERS,  AND  SCIENCES.  375 

naturalness  and  grace  of  Le  Sueur  nor  the  dash  of  Rubens 
nor  the  profound  thought  of  Poussin.  However,  he  was 
truly  a  painter,  and  chief  among  those  reckoned  in  the 
second  class.  The  Museum  of  the  Louvre  owns  his  "Battles 
of  Alexander."  To  him  is  due  the  foundation  of  the  French 
school  at  Rome,  where  young  artists  who  at  the  annual 
contest  in  Paris  have  gained  what  is  called  the  Grand  Prize 
of  Rome  are  sent  at  the  expense  of  the  government  to  com- 
plete their  studies  face  to  face  with  the  masterpieces  of 
antiquity  and  of  the  great  Italian  painters.  At  the  side  of 
these  four  chiefs  a  place  must  be  reserved  for  Philippe 
de  Champagne,  who  has  left  admirable  portraits  and  one 
masterpiece,  the  "Apparition  of  St.  Gervais  and  of  St. 
Protais"',  and  for  Mignard  (1610-95).  The  latter  was  for  a 
time  the  rival  of  Le  Brun,  and  is  famous  for  his  vast  fresco 
in  the  Val-de-Grace,  but  is  less  esteemed  in  the  eyes  of 
posterity,  which  has  applied  the  term  mignardise  to  all 
affectation  of  delicacy  and  grace. 

Claude  Gelee,  called  Claude  Lorraine  because  born  in  Lor- 
raine in  1600,  who  died  at  Rome  in  1682,  is  the  best  French 
landscape  painter,  and  one  of  the  best  in  Europe.  He  is 
the  painter  of  light.  In  the  Louvre  the  richness  of  his 
style  and  the  beauty  of  his  coloring  are  still  admired  in  the 
ten  landscapes  or  sea  scenes  which  that  museum  possesses  of 
him. 

Puget  like  Michael  Angelo,  whom  he  resembled  by  his 
high  spirit  and  energy,  was  at  once  painter,  architect,  and 
sculptor.  He  was  born  at  Marseilles  in  1622  and  died  in 
1694.  For  a  long  time  he  carved  wooden  figures  for  the 
sterns  and  galleries  of  the  ships  of  Toulon;  he  filled  Genoa 
with  his  masterpieces,  and  made  for  Louis  XIV.  the  group  of 
"Perseus"  and  that  of  "Milo  of  Crotona."  This  last  statue, 
where  the  flesh  lives,  might  rival  by  energy  of  expression 
and  fidelity  of  design  whatever  antiquity  has  left  us  most 
magnificent  if  there  were  found  in  it  that  nobility  of  form 
which  the  artist  never  should  forget  even  when  desiring  only 
to  represent  material  strength.  The  mighty  athlete,  thir- 
teen times  crowned  by  all  Greece,  ought  to  show  upon  his 
features  contracted  by  suffering  the  recollection  of  so  many 
victories.  One  too  fully  realizes  that  the  great  artist  was 
playing  with  the  marble,  and,  as  he  himself  said,  "nursed 
in  great  achievements,  he  soared  when  he  was  working, 
and  the  marble  trembled  before  him  however  vast  was  the 


376  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.          [BOOK  V. 

block."  The  character  of  Puget  was  too  independent  for 
him  to  succeed  at  Versailles.  He  came  thither,  \vas  well 
greeted,  but  received  for  his  '  'Milo"  hardly  the  sum  which  he 
had  expended  in  its  execution.  He  left  no  pupils.  Coyse- 
vox,  the  two  Coustous,  and  Girardon  are  the  product  of 
another  system ;  they  are  graceful  sculptors,  masters  of  a 
style  that  is  brilliant  and  facile,  but  destitute  of  elevation. 
The  Tuileries  possesses  from  the  former  the  '  'Winged  Steeds" 
which  adorn  the  entrance  on  the  side  of  the  Place  de  la  Con- 
corde, the  "Flute  Player,"  the  "Flora"  and  the  Hama- 
dryad" in  front  of  the  palace;  from  Nicolas  Coustou,  the 
"Seine,"  the  "Marne,"  the  "Shepherd  Huntsman,"  and 
"Julius  Caesar";  from  Guillaume  Coustou,  "  Hippomenes 
and  Atalanta" ;  the  "Untamed  Horses"  seen  at  the 
entrance  of  the  Champs  Elysees  are  by  the  same  artist. 
Girardon  has  peopled  Versailles  with  his  works;  the  mau- 
soleum of  Cardinal  Richelieu  at  the  Sorbonne  is  his  best. 
The  engravings  of  Callot  Nanteuil  and  Audran  enrich 
throughout  Europe  the  cabinets  of  those  who  are  unable  to 
possess  paintings. 

Franfois  Mansart  forgot  the  elegance  and  grace  of  the 
Renaissance  for  a  style  which  he  considered  majestic  and 
which  was  only  heavy.  He  began  the  Val-de-Grace,  and 
built  the  Chateau  de  Maisons  near  St.  Germain-en-Laye. 
He  invented  the  mansard  roof,  which  sometimes  produces  a 
happy  effect  by  breaking  the  too  monotonous  surface  of  the 
highest  parts,  but  sometimes  deprives  them  of  their  light- 
ness. His  nephew,  Jules  Hardouin  Mansart,  constructed 
Versailles,  Marly,  the  Grand-Trianon,  St.  Cyr,  the  Place 
Vendome,  the  Place  des  Victoires,  and  the  dome  of  the 
Invalides.  His  is  a  cold,  formal  genius.  He  almost 
attained  grandeur,  inasmuch  as  Louis  XIV.  stinted  him 
in  neither  opportunity  nor  money;  but  save  in  his  beauti- 
ful dome  of  the  Invalides  he  seems  deficient  in  aspi- 
ration and  elegance.  Claude  Perrault  (1628-80)  was  a 
physician,  physicist,  and  great  architect,  and,  in  spite  of 
Boileau,  deserved  his  reputation.  His  plans  for  the  east 
front  of  the  Louvre  were  preferred  to  those  of  Bernini;  the 
colonnade  is  his  work.  Le  Notre  (1613-1700),  another 
artist  of  genius,  created  landscape  gardening;  from  it  he 
was  able  to  develop  the  finest  decorations  of  the  chateaux. 
With  the  agreeable  the  land  surveyor  La  Quintinie  com- 
bined the  useful.  Louis  XIV.  employed  them  both,  and 


CHAP.  XXIII.]     ARTS,  LETTERS,  AND  SCIENCES.  377 

their  names  deserve  to  be  added  to  those  of  the  illustrious 
men  of  that  grand  century. 

The  Florentine  Lulli  at  the  age  of  thirteen  came  to  Paris 
and  was  with  Quinault,  the  real  founder  of  the  opera  in 
France.  His  music,  even  the  church  music  in  which  he 
excelled,  appears  to  us  cold  and  destitute  of  character. 
His  contemporaries  judged  him  differently.  "I  do  not 
believe,"  wrote  Mine,  de  Sevigne  on  coming  out  from  the 
funeral  service  of  Chancellor  Seguier,  "that  there  is  any 
other  music  in  heaven." 

The  principal  monuments  of  the  reign  of  Louis  XIV.  are 
the  Val-de-Grace,  commenced  by  Fran9ois  Mansart,  the 
elegantly  sloping  dome  of  which  was  decorated  on  the  inside 
by  Mignard  with  a  fresco*  which  distantly  recalls  the  great 
wall  paintings  of  Italy ;  the  College  Mazarin,  now  the  Insti- 
tute, built  by  the  architect  Louis  Levau ;  the  Observatory, 
constructed  in  part  from  designs  by  the  astronomer  Picard 
(1666);  the  gates  St.  Denis  and  St.  Martin,  commenced  in 
1670  by  Blondel  and  his  pupil  Bullet;  the  Invalides,  a 
work  of  the  architect  Liberal  Bruant  (1674),  with  its  church, 
narrow  in  proportion  to  the  elegant  and  imposing  dome 
which  Jules  Mansart  surmounted  by  so  bold  a  spire;  the 
Place  du  Carrousel,  or  of  the  Tournament,  between  the 
Louvre  and  the  Tuileries,  so  named  from  a  magnificent 
tournament  given  there  in  1662  ;  the  Place  des  Victoires 
and  the  Place  Vendome,  created  or  enlarged  to  receive  the 
statues  which  Marshal  de  la  Feuillade  and  the  municipality 
of  Paris  had  erected  to  Louis  XIV.  at  the  time  of  the  treaty 
of  Nimeguen. 

From  the  beginning  of  the  reign  work  had  continued  on 
the  Tuileries.  Levau  in  1664  raised  the  dome  of  the  Hor- 
loge,  which  completed  the  west  front,  though  giving  it  a 
heavy  appearance;  the  following  year  the  garden,  laid  out 
after  a  new  design  by  Le  Notre,  was  joined  to  the  palace, 
from  which  one  street  had  separated  it.  It  was  extended  to 
the  Champs  Elysees,  which  were  planted  with  trees  in  1670, 
at  the  same  time  as  the  northern  boulevards  on  the  site  of  the 
former  city  moats. 

There  was   more   to  be  done  for  the   Louvre.     Under 


*  This  is  probably  the  largest  single  fresco  in  Europe,  larger  even 
than  Correggio's  "Assumption,"  which  fills  the  whole  cupola  of  the 
Duomo  of  Parma. — ED. 


378  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

Louis  XIII.  the  architect  Lemercier  had  terminated  the 
interior  western  front  by  the  construction  of  the  dome  of 
the  Horloge,  which  was  adorned  by  the  eight  colossal  cary- 
atides of  Sarrazin.  The  task  then  remained  of  completing 
the  masterpiece  of  Pierre  Lescot.  For  this  purpose  Colbert 
invited  competition  among  all  the  artists  of  France  and 
Italy.  The  plans  of  the  physician  Claude  Perrault  were 
adopted.  As  early  as  1666  the  eastern  external  front  arose 
opposite  the  Church  of  St.  Germain  1'Auxerrois;  this  was 
the  famous  colonnade  of  the  Louvre.  At  the  same  time 
the  outer  southern  front  on  the  side  of  the  present  Rue  de 
Rivoli  was  commenced.  These  great  undertakings  were  at 
first  pressed  forward  with  activity ;  little  by  little  the  work  was 
slackened,  and  finally  suspended,  despite  all  the  entreaties 
of  Colbert.  The  king  was  then  constructing  Versailles. 

Versailles  had  been  under  Louis  XIII.  only  a  village  and 
a  rendezvous  of  hunting  parties.  Louis  XIV.  wished  to 
make  of  it  a  great  city  and  a  palace.  The  works  under- 
taken in  1661  were  in  1670  intrusted  to  Jules  Mansart  and 
continued  uninterruptedly  till  the  close  of  the  reign.  Le 
Notre,  Le  Brun  and  his  pupils,  especially  Girardon,  con- 
tinued to  embellish  that  too  highly  lauded  royal  dwelling, 
which  cost  more  than  250,000,000  francs,  and  in  which 
France  nowhere  appears,  but  everywhere  the  king. 

Water  was  lacking  at  Versailles:  at  immense  expense 
Louis  had  the  machine  of  Marly  constructed,  which  was 
devised  by  the  genius  of  Rennequin  Sualem,  an  engineer 
from  Liege,  and  completed  in  eight  years  (1675-83).  This 
appeared  insufficient,  and  the  king  thought  of  diverting  the 
River  Eure  and  bringing  it  to  Versailles  across  valleys  and 
hills.  This  was  a  gigantic  undertaking  which  transports 
us  to  the  days  of  the  pompous  and  wasteful  constructions 
of  the  Pharaohs.  During  several  years  10,000  soldiers  were 
occupied  in  these  labors;  but  pestilential  diseases,  and 
especially  the  wars  which  ensued,  forced  their  suspension, 
and  nothing  remained  save  prodigious  and  useless  ruins. 

Close  to  Versailles  the  king  was  building  at  the  same  time 
the  Grand-Trianon,  twice  reconstructed  (1671-1703),  and 
Marly  (1679),  which  according  to  St.  Simon  must  have  cost 
as  many  millions  as  Versailles;  his  estimate,  however,  we 
must  reduce  to  40,000,000  francs,  which  is  ample  for 
a  summer  cottage!  Finally,  the  chateaux  of  St.  Germain, 
Fontainebleau,  Chambord,  St.  Cloud,  and  Sceaux  were 


CHAP.  XXIII.]     ARTS,  LETTERS,  AND  SCIENCES.  379 

enlarged,  renovated,  and  embellished,  especially  by  the 
magnificent  gardens  of  Le  Notre. 

I  have  elsewhere  spoken  of  the  great  works  of  public 
utility,  the  harbors,  arsenals,  strongholds,  and  the  Canal  of 
the  South.  There  is,  however,  none  the  less,  an  excessive 
disproportion  between  the  expenses  incurred  for  the  fancies 
of  the  king  and  those  which  had  as  their  object  the  interests 
of  the  country.  This  was  the  inevitable  consequence  of  a 
political  regime  which  subjected  all  the  wealth  of  the  nation, 
without  discussion,  without  control,  absolutely  to  the  dis- 
cretion of  the  monarch. 

In  Italy  there  was  a  literary  just  as  there  was  a  political 

decline.     Italian  poetry  showed  its  feebleness  in  the  "Secchia 

T   .,  Rapita"  (Rape  of    the   Bucket)    of  Tassoni 

Letters      and  *•  /•       \          j     •        i        IIAI        •    i  >       /••»»•       •• 

arts  in  foreign  (1565-1655)  and  in  the  Adonis  of  Marmi 
(1569-1625);  the  lyric  poems  of  Guidi 
(1650-1712),  of  Filicaja  (1642-1707),  and  of  Manzo,  one 
of  the  founders  of  the  Academia  degli  Oziosi  at  Naples,  did 
not  elevate  its  rank. 

Portugal  had  had  in  the  preceding  century  one  great 
poet,  Camoens  (1517-79),  the  singer  of  the  Lusiad.  She 
developed  no  other.  Spain  had  just  lost  Ercilla  (1530-1600), 
who  had  himself  chanted  his  exploits  and  those  of  his  com- 
panions in  Chili  against  the  Araucanians,  but  she  possessed 
Lope  de  Vega  (1562-1635),  who  composed,  it  is  said, 
eighteen  hundred  theatrical  pieces;  Calderon  (1600-87), 
Canon  of  Toledo,  to  whom  fifteen  hundred  were  attributed ; 
and  the  immortal  author  of  "Don  Quixote,"  Miguel  de 
Cervantes  (1547-1616). 

England  without  fear  presents  herself  with  Shakspere, 
her  Corneille  and  Moliere  all  in  one;  with  Milton,  the 
author  of  "Paradise  Lost"  ;  with  Dryden,  the  poet  laureate 
of  Charles  II.,  who  placed  himself  at  the  head  of  the  classical 
writers  of  his  country,  but  who  dishonored  his  talents  by  his 
venality  (1631-1701) ;  with  Addison  (1672-1719),  author  of 
"Cato  of  Utica,"  one  of  the  best  English  tragedies,  Shaks- 
pere's  excepted,  and  editor  of  the  Spectator  j  with  Pope 
(1688-1744),  a  writer  of  rare  elegance,  who  translated 
Homer,  and  wrote  the  "Dunciad,"  a  satirical  poem,  and 
the  "Essay  on  Man,"  wherein  is  found  the  philosophy  of 
Bolingbroke,  but  who  belongs  to  the  following  century. 

Germany  was  in  her  iron  age ;  she  presented  only  the 
mystic  shoemaker  Jakob  Boehme  (1575-1625)  and  Martin 


380  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

Opitz  (1597-1639),  who  practiced  all  literary  styles  and  had 
a  somewhat  large  influence  on  the  German  language  and 
literature. 

History  produced  none  of  those  great  compositions  which 
never  grow  old  and  which  are  always  read.  Italy  had 
Pietro  Sarpi,  called  Fra  Paolo  (15152-1623),  the  historian  of 
the  Council  of  Trent;  Davila  (1576-1631),  who  wrote  a 
history  of  the  civil  wars  of  France  from  the  death  of  Henry 
II.  to  the  peace  of  Vervins;  and  Cardinal  Bentivoglio  of 
Ferrara  (1579-1641),  author  of  a  history  of  the  War  of 
Flanders.  England  presents  Earl  Clarendon  (1608-74), 
Lord  Chancellor  under  Charles  II.,  whose  "History  of  the 
Rebellion"  by  its  name  indicates  its  spirit;  Whitelocke 
(1608-76),  author  of  interesting  memoirs  treating  of  the 
revolution;  the  diplomat  Sir  William  Temple  (1628-98), 
who  brought  about  the  triple  alliance  of  1668  and  left 
curious  memoirs  upon  Holland;  and  Burnet  (1643-1715),  the 
stormy  Bishop  of  Salisbury,  who  wrote  a  history  of  the 
Reformation  in  England  and  a  history  of  his  own  times, 
which  are  partisan  works.  In  Spain  the  Jesuit.  Mariana 
(1537-1624)  wrote  the  "History  of  Spain";  Herrara 
(1559-1625),  "History  of  the  Indies";  Solis  (1610-86), 
"History  of  the  Conquest  of  Mexico." 

In  political  philosophy  two  great  names  are  presented : 
the  Dutch  Hugo  Grotius,  or  Van  Groot  (1583-1646),  whose 
treatise  "De  Jure  Pacis  et  Belli"  created  an  epoch  in 
international  law,  and  the  Swede  Samuel  Pufendorf  (1632- 
94),  who  is  equally  celebrated  for  his  book  "De  Jure 
Naturae  et  Gentium,"  wherein  he  applies  the  principle  of 
ethics  and  morals  to  human  relations  in  society. 

In  the  field  of  speculative  philosophy  England  would 
reign  supreme  if  France  did  not  possess  Descartes,  and 
Germany  Leibnitz.  Francis  Bacon  (1561-1626),  who  was 
a  minister  of  state  under  James  I.,  founded  in  the  "Xovum 
Organum"  the  method  of  observation  and  experiment  which 
leads  to  the  discovery  of  facts,  and  the  method  of  induction 
which  leads  to  the  discovery  of  natural  laws.  It  is  by 
advancing  in  this  path  that  modern  science  has  made  as 
much  progress.  Another  Englishman,  Thomas  Hobbes 
(1588-1680),  wished  to  prove  in  his  "Leviathan"  that  the 
natural  state  of  mankind  was  war,  and  that  a  good  despot 
was  necessary  to  prevent  men  cutting  each  other's  throats. 
Cudworth  (1617-88),  a  metaphysician,  explained  the  union 


CHAP.  XXIII.]    ARTS,  LETTERS,  AND  SCIENCES.  31 

of  the  soul  and  body  by  the  hypothesis  of  a  plastic  medium, 
thereby  removing  the  difficulty  farther,  but  not  resolving  it; 
Clarke,  another  metaphysician,  a  friend  of  Newton,  for  a 
long  time  argued  against  Leibnitz  in  his  letters,  and  left  a 
treatise  "On  the  Being  and  Attributes  of  God  and  the  Evi- 
dences of  Natural  and  Revealed  Religion." 

Three  illustrious  men  have  a- place  apart:  the  Jew  Spinoza 
of  Amsterdam  (1632-77),  a  pantheistic  philosopher;  the 
English  Locke  (1632-1704),  who  in  his  "Essay  on  the 
Understanding"  assigns  no  other  origin  to  our  ideas  than 
sensation  and  reflection;  finally,  the  universal  Leibnitz 
(1646-1716),  born  at  Leipsic,  who  in  order  to  account  for 
the  origin  of  ideas  imagined  the  system  of  monads,  simple 
substances  capable  of  action  and  perception  ;  who  explained 
by  a  pre-established  harmony  the  union  of  soul  and  body, 
repelled  in  his  "Theodicee"  the  attacks  of  Bayle  against 
Providence,  and  conceived  the  project  of  a  universal  hand- 
writing. 

Art  did  not  hold  its  place  at  the  height  to  which  the  six- 
teenth century  had  raised  it ;  but  if  the  artists  were  less  gifted 
they  were  more  numerous,  and  several  schools  disputed  the 
pre-eminence.  The  first  rank  did  not  belong  to  France,  but 
to  the  two  Dutch  and  Flemish  schools,  represented  by 
Rubens,  Van  Dyck,  Rembrandt,  and  the  older  and  younger 
Teniers.  The  latter  school  followed  the  beaten  track  and 
dealt  on  a  large  scale  with  historical  or  sacred  painting;  but 
the  former  inaugurated  a  new  genre,  easel  painting.  Hence 
appeared  those  tiny  pictures  whose  size  the  current  prices 
seem  to  magnify.  Whence  comes  this  phenomenon?  From 
the  fact  that  Calvinism,  iconoclastic  in  essence,  forbade  the 
representation  of  biblical  scenes ;  and  that  Protestant  auster- 
ity forbade  those  which  were  fabulous;  just  as  republican 
manners,  moderate  fortunes,  and  humble  habitations  rejected 
those  ostentatious  representations  which  are  loved  in  the 
palaces  of  the  great.  The  golden  age  of  Dutch  painting,  the 
seventeenth  century,  bequeathed  only  seven  large  canvases, 
five  of  which  are  at  the  Museum  of  Amsterdam  and  two  at 
the  Museum  of  The  Hague.  A  gloomy  and  misty  sky,  a  life 
passed  at  the  domestic  hearth,  held  the  imagination  captive, 
as  it  were,  upon  the  earth.  The  Dutch  had  no  other  desire 
or  need  than  to  paint  their  home  and  city  festivals,  that 
half-submerged  soil  which  had  saved  their  independence,  and 
those  extended  prairies  and  splendid  flocks  which  were  their 


382  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

wealth  and  joy.  It  was  in  Holland  that  for  the  first  time 
Nature  was  painted  as  she  is,  and  not  for  the  sake  of  borrow- 
ing from  her  some  means  of  decoration.  The  Italian 
school,  inferior  to  the  Dutch,  Flemish,  and  French  both  in 
idea  and  style,  and  in  the  imitative  faculty,  reckoned  with 
pride — now  that  the  three  Caraccis  of  Bologna,  Paul 
Veronese  and  Tintoretto  of  Venice  were  dead — Guido, 
Albano,  Domenichino,  Guercino,  the  high-spirited  Salvator 
Rosa,  and  Bernini.  Germany,  and  England  produced  only 
a  few  painters.  Spain,  on  the  contrary,  possessed  several 
exalted  names:  Velasquez,  Murillo,  and  Ribera.  The 
French  painters  had  indeed  some  rivals,  at  times  successful; 
but  the  French  sculptors  had  none.  There  was  no  celebrated 
statuary  in  Europe  save  Bernini,  whose  affected  taste 
exercised  an  unhappy  influence  on  the  Italian  artists. 

Letters  have  a  fatherland,    for  they  reflect  the  national 

genius  and    that  of    the  writer;     the  sciences  have    none. 

_  .         .  There   are    French,    Italian,    English    litera- 

Science  in  the 

seventeenth  tures ;  there  is  everywhere  but  one  same 
century.  science,  only  it  receives  here  and  there  a 

different  impulse  according  to  the  mental  diversity  of  those 
who  labor  to  press  it  forward.  Distinction  of  nationality  is 
no  longer  a  matter  of  necessity,  but  of  entirely  secondary 
interest. 

If  science  differs  little  among  countries  of  almost  equal 
civilization,  it  differs  greatly  from  one  century  to  another. 
Antiquity  and  the  Middle  Ages  had  been  able  to  culti- 
vate the  rational  sciences  with  success,  but  the  study  of 
the  physical  world  was  smitten  with  barrenness,  inasmuch 
as  true  experimental  methods  had  not  been  found.  Nor 
could  they  be  discovered  until  men  had  become  assured 
that  the  universe  is  governed  by  the  immutable  laws  of 
an  eternal  wisdom,  and  not  by  the  arbitrary  impulses  of 
capricious  forces.  Then  only  could  the  human  mind  no 
longer  be  accused  of  sacrilegious  rashness  when  it  sought  to 
penetrate  the  secrets  of  creation.  "Gens  humana  ruit  per- 
vetitum  nefas." 

Alchemy,  magic,  astrology,  all  such  follies  of  the  Middle 
Ages,  became  sciences  from  the  moment  that  man,  lingering 
no  longer  upon  isolated  phenomena,  endeavored  to  grasp  the 
very  laws  which  produced  them.  That  day  began  with 
Copernicus  in  the  sixteenth  century,  but  only  in  the  seven- 
teenth was  the  revolution  accomplished  and  made  trium- 


CHAP.  XXIII.]     ARTS,  LETTERS,  AND  SCIENCES.  383 

phant  with  Bacon  and  Galileo:  the  former  proclaimed  its 
necessity;  the  latter  by  his  discoveries  demonstrated  its 
beneficence. 

The  new  method  did  not  at  first  dare  apply  itself  to  the 
entire  field  of  human  knowledge.  It  especially  seconded 
and  enlarged  the  sciences  which  were  already  cultivated,  as 
mathematics  and  astronomy.  Hence  it  afforded  an  admi- 
rable and  vigorous  education  of  the  scientific  spirit,  which 
was  to  burst  its  bonds  toward  the  close  of  the  following 
century,  and  in  the  nineteenth  to  accomplish  so  many 
marvels. 

Four  men  were  at  the  head  of  the  scientific  movement  of 
the  century : 

John  Kepler  of  Wurtemburg  (1571-1631),  who  demon- 
strated the  truth  of  the  Copernican  system  and  discovered 
the  three  fundamental  laws  of  planetary  motion:  (i)  That 
the  planetary  orbits  are  ellipses  in  which  the  sun  occupies 
one  of  the  foci ;  (2)  that  the  radius  vector  of  a  planet 
passes  over  equal  areas  in  equal  times;  (3)  that  the  squares 
of  the  times  of  planetary  revolutions  about  the  sun  are  pro- 
portional to  the  cubes  of  their  mean  distances  from  that 
body. 

Galileo  of  Pisa  (1546-1642),  who  in  1633  expiated  in 
the  prisons  of  the  Inquisition  his  demonstration  of  terres- 
trial motion,  discovered  the  laws  of  gravitation ;  he  invented 
the  pendulum,  the  hydrostatic  balance,  the  thermometer, 
the  proportional  compass,  and  outlined  the  telescope;  while 
his  disciple,  Torricelli  of  Faenza  (1608-47),  recognized  the 
weight  of  the  air,  constructed  the  first  barometer,  and  per- 
fected spectacles. 

The  English  Newton  (1642-1727),  who  discovered  the 
infinitesimal  calculus,  decomposed  light,  and  ascertained  the 
principal  laws  of  optics  and  of  universal  gravitation,  that 
is  to  say,  he  explained  the  system  of  the  world. 

Finally,  Leibnitz,  of  whom  we  have  already  spoken,  who 
disputed  with  Newton  the  honor  of  having  discovered  the 
differential  calculus. 

France  had  Descartes  and  Pascal.  The  former,  by  invent- 
ing the  notation  of  powers  by  numerical  exponents,  gave  an 
immense  impulse  to  algebra,  and  likewise  to  curved  geom- 
etry, and  was  enabled  to  resolve  as  in  child's  play  prob- 
lems till  then  esteemed  insolvable.  He  discovered  the 
true  law  of  refraction ;  he  believed  like  Galileo  in  the  revo- 


3^4  THE  ASCENDENCY  OF  FRANCE.  [BOOK  V. 

lution  of  the  earth  round  the  sun ;  and  as  the  errors  of 
genius  are  fruitful,  his  chimerical  system  of  tourbillions, 
according  to  which  the  sun  and  the  fixed  stars  are  the  center 
of  as  many  tourbillions  of  subtle  matter  which  causes  the 
planets  to  revolve  around  them,  has  been  the  germ  of  the 
celebrated  Newtonian  hypothesis  of  attraction.  For  Des- 
cartes as  for  Newton  the  problem  of  the  physical  universe 
was  a  problem  of  mechanics;  and  Descartes  was  the  first  to 
teach,  if  not  the  solution,  at  least  the  true  nature,  of  the 
problem.  Pascal  when  twelve  years  old  had  mastered  alone 
and  without  books  the  elements  of  geometry ;  at  sixteen  he 
composed  his  treatise  "On  Conic  Sections."  A  little  later 
he  created  the  calculation  of  probabilities,  demonstrated  the 
weight  of  the  air  by  his  famous  experiments  upon  the  Puy 
de  Dome,  and  devised  a  kind  of  dray  and  perhaps  the 
hydraulic  press. 

Below  those  great  men  crowded  an  already  numerous 
multitude. 

Pierre  Fermat  (1601-65),  counselor  of  the  parliament  of 
Toulouse,  printed  nothing,  but  was  perhaps  the  most  power- 
ful mathematical  mind  of  the  time.  He  shared  with  Des- 
cartes the  honor  of  having  applied  algebra  to  geometry,  con- 
ceived the  method  of  maxima  and  minima,  and  at  the  same 
time  as  Pascal  devised  the  calculation  of  probabilities.  The 
Abbe  Mariotte  (1620-84)  recognized  that  the  volume  of  a 
gas  at  a  constant  temperature  varies  in  inverse  proportion  to 
the  pressure  sustained.  Denis  Papin,  born  at  Blois  in 
1647,  invented  or  perfected  several  machines,  and  was  the 
first  to  think  of  employing  condensed  steam  as  a  motive 
power.  In  Germany  on  the  Fulda  he  made  experiments 
with  a  real  steamboat  which  ascended  the  current.  Stupid 
bargemen  broke  the  engine  of  the  great  physicist,  who  died 
at  London  in  misery  (1710). 

Geography  was  reformed  by  Nicolas  Samson  (1600-67) 
and  by  Guillaume  Delisle  (1675-1726),  whose  maps  are 
esteemed  to-day.  Tournefort  (1656-1706)  renewed  the 
science  of  botany  and  enriched  the  Royal  Garden  by  new 
plants  to  collect  which  he  made  a  journey  to  the  Levant. 

Three  foreigners  whom  Colbert  attracted  to  France 
through  their,  labors  justified  the  good  will  of  the  king: 
The  Danish  Roemer  determined  the  velocity  of  solar  rays 
with  almost  entire  accuracy;  the  Dutch  Huyghens  dis- 
covered the  ring  and  one  of  the  satellites  of  Saturn;  the 


CHAP.  XXIII.]     ARTS,  LETTERS,  AND  SCIENCES.  385 

Italian  Domenico  Cassini,  the  four  others.  To  Huyghens 
is  due  the  invention  of  pendulum  clocks.  Cassini,  together 
with  Abbe  J.  Picard,  professor  of  astronomy  at  the  College 
of  France,  commenced  the  first  investigations  which  were  to 
serve  in  measuring  the  earth;  and  both  in  1669  began  the 
survey  of  an  arc  of  the  meridian,  afterward  prolonged  to 
Roussillon.  From  the  measure  of  the  degree  given  by 
Picard,  Newton  was  able  to  estimate  the  force  which  holds 
the  moon  in  its  orbit. 

Great  Britain  had  the  Scotch  John  Napier  (1550-1617), 
the  inventor  of  logarithms,  and 'James  Gregory  (1633-75), 
the  inventor  of  the  reflecting  telescope;  Harvey  (1578— 
1657),  physician  of  James  I.  and  Charles  I.,  who  demon- 
strated in  1628  the  circulation  of  the  blood;  the  astronomer 
Halley  of  London  (1656-1742),  who  gave  his  name  to  a 
comet  whose  return  he  predicted;  and  the  Irish  chemist 
Robert  Boyle  (1626-91),  who  perfected  the  air  pump  and 
contributed  to  the  foundation  of  the  Royal  Society  of 
London. 

Holland  produced  Huyghens  of  The  Hague  (1629-95) 
and  the  physician  Boerhaave  (1668-1738),  who  was  the  first 
to  decompose  all  animal  fluids.  Switzerland  is  represented 
by  the  two  Bernouillis — Jacques  (1654-1705),  who  was  one  of 
the  first  to  apply  the  differential  and  the  integral  calculus, 
and  John,  his  brother  (1667-1748),  a  profound  geometrician 
and  distinguished  physicist. 

Thus  in  this  century  Italy,  if  Galileo  is  omitted,  whom  she 
persecuted,  and  Germany,  if  her  two  great  men  Kepler, 
who  almost  died  of  misery,  and  Leibnitz  are  excepted, 
were  in  complete  intellectual  decline.  Spain,  like  a  ruined 
Croesus  who  has  retained  from  his  lost  fortune  only  a  few 
precious  jewels,  points  out  her  eminent  painters  and  three 
prolific  writers.  But  France  and  England,  the  countries  to 
which  strength  and  preponderance  had  passed,  were  then  in 
the  full  tide  of  their  grand  literary  century.  The  former 
pre-eminently  placed  herself  at  the  head  of  modern  civiliza- 
tion, and  by  the  acknowledged  superiority  of  her  intellect 
and  her  taste  made  all  Europe  accept  the  peaceful  sway 
of  her  artists  and  writers. 


BOOK   VI. 

THE      EIGHTEENTH      CENTURY.  —  GREAT- 
NESS OF  ENGLAND,  RUSSIA,  AND  PRUSSIA. 


CHAPTER  XXIV. 
RISE  OF   RUSSIA  AND  RUIN   OF   SWEDEN. 


Peter  the  Great  and  Russia  at  the  Beginning  of  the  Eighteenth  Century; 
Power  of  Sweden  ;  Narva  and  Pultowa. — Charles  XII.  at  Bender  ; 
Treaties  of  the  Pruth  (1711)  and  Nystadt  (1721). — Second  Journey  of 
Peter  to  Europe  (1716);  St.  Petersburg;  the  Czar  Chief  of  the 
Russian  Church. 


AT  the  very  moment  when  the  war  of  the  Spanish  succes- 
sion caused  the  predominance  in  western  Europe  to  pass 
from  the  hands  of  France  to  those  of 
Great  and  RUS-  England,  another  war  delivered  eastern 
n^ngtthoefbegthne~  Europe  to  Russia  and  precipitated  Sweden, 
eighteenth  cen-  the  ancient  ally  of  France,  from  the  high  posi- 

tury  ;    power  of      •  •,  •    •,        ,        u     j    -u  j    i_        /~> 

Sweden ;  Narva  tion  to  which  she  had  been  raised  by  Gus- 
and  Puitowa.  tavus  Adolphus  and  Charles  XI. 

This  chapter  might  have  as  its  title:  How  an  Empire 
Crumbles  and  How  an  Empire  Rises.  The  two  names 
Charles  XII.  and  Peter  I.  mark  in  fact  the  fall  of  Sweden 
and  the  advent  of  Russia  among  the  great  European  powers. 

Toward  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  century  Russia 
already  included  an  immense  territory,  which  stretched 
from  the  frozen  ocean  to  the  Caspian  Sea.  Its  inhabitants, 
relegated  to  the  confines  of  Europe  and  of  civilization, 
seemed  hardly  human  to  the  rare  English  or  Dutch  mer- 
chants who  trafficked  in  their  country.  But  the  servile 
abjectness  of  the  peasant  before  the  nobles,  and  of  the 
nobles  before  the  Czar,  put  into  the  hands  of  the  latter  a 

387 


388  THE  EIGHTEENTH   CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

formidable  instrument  of  despotism.  In  the  time  of 
Colbert  the  learned  Huet,  Bishop  of  Avranches,  had  said : 
"If  one  day  there  should  arise  among  them  a  prince  who 
could  mold  their  ferocious  spirit  and  their  harsh  and 
unsociable  manners,  and  who  could  employ  usefully  their 
vast  multitude,  this  nation  would  become  formidable  to  its 
neighbors." 

When  Feodor  III.,  the  eldest  of  the  sons  of  Alexis,  died 
in  1682,  the  title  of  Czar  was  shared  by  his  two  brothers, 
Ivan  and  Peter;  but  the  authority  remained  in  the  hands  of 
their  sister,  Sophia.  In  1689  Peter,  having  reached  the  age 
of  seventeen,  succeeded  in  confining  this  ambitious  princess 
in  a  convent,  and  decided  his  brother,  whose  mind  was  piti- 
fully weak,  and  who  was  almost  blind  and  dumb,  to  lay 
down  his  power.  Under  the  lead  of  the  Genevese  Lefort 
he  had  prepared  and  accomplished  this  revolution.  With- 
out cessation  Lefort  vaunted  to  him  the  arts  of  Europe  and 
the  authority  of  its  kings,  the  organization  of  their  armies 
and  fleets.  Peter  himself  wished  also  to  possess  a  navy 
and  an  army. 

Impatient  to  try  his  nascent  forces  and  to  approach  the 
Black  Sea,  where  he  already  dreamed  of  owning  a  powerful 
fleet,  he  declared  war  against  Turkey  in  1695.  His  success 
was  by  no  means  brilliant,  although  he  captured  Azof  (1696). 
He  felt  that  to  succeed  in  his  projects  he  must  initiate 
himself  into  the  secrets  of  European  civilization;  so  he  set 
out  to  visit  the  polished  nations  of  the  west.  In  1697  he 
quitted  Moscow,  betook  himself  to  Saardam  in  Holland,  and 
there,  under  the  name  of  Peter  Michailoff,  generally  called 
by  his  companions  Peterbaas,  he  worked  during  many 
months  as  a  simple  dockyard  laborer.  Thus  he  learned  the 
art  of  constructing,  launching,  rigging,  and  managing  a  ship. 
He  sent  into  his  states  a  colony  of  artisans,  sailors,  engineers, 
and  workmen  of  all  sorts.  He  then  went  to  study  England 
with  its  manufactures,  and  Germany  with  its  military  organi- 
zation. At  Vienna  he  learned  of  a  revolt  of  the  strelitzi,  a 
formidable  body  which  recalls  the  praetorians  of  Rome  and 
the  janissaries  of  Turkey.  Peter  had  narrowly  escaped 
being  their  victim  in  1682.  This  time  it  was  the  Princess 
Sophia  who  from  the  recesses  of  her  cloister  stirred  them  up 
in  order  to  again  seize  the  power.  Peter  hastened  home, 
caused  2000  of  the  mutineers  to  be  hung  or  broken  on  the 
wheel,  had  5000  beheaded,  and,  armed  with  an  ax,  him- 


CHAP.  XXIV.]  RISE   OF  RUSSIA.  389 

self  filled  the  office  of  executioner.  During  more  than  a 
month  he  thus  daily  slew  some  with  his  own  hand,  and  each 
day  a  larger  number  (1698).  Later  during  his  orgies  he 
still  had  strelitzi  brought  him  from  prison,  and  showed  his 
address  by  striking  off  their  heads.  This  seditious  militia 
was  abolished  without  resistance.  A  revolt  of  former 
strelitzi  at  Astrakhan  in  1705  and  another  of  Cossacks  of  the 
Don  at  Azof  were  quickly  repressed.  The  Czar  paid  the 
Cossacks  the  same  honor  as  the  strelitzi ;  eighty-four  of  their 
chiefs  were  sent  to  Moscow  and  perished  by  his  hand. 

Lefort  died  in  1699,  but  the  Czar  continued  his  reforms. 
He  organized  regiments  after  the  pattern  of  those  which 
he  had  seen  in  Germany,  with  regular  exercises,  short 
jackets,  and  uniforms.  He  compelled  the  sons  of  the 
boyars  to  serve  as  soldiers  or  sailors  before  becoming  offi- 
cers. He  had  foreign  books  translated  which  treated  of 
engineering  and  artillery,  and  he  founded  schools — one 
under  the  name  of  School  of  Naval  Cadets,  others  for 
mathematics  and  astronomy.  He  endowed  Moscow  with  a 
hospital,  and  from  verst  to  verst  (3500  feet)  he  set  up 
painted  posts  to  guide  travelers  and  merchants;  and  he  had 
a  canal  commenced  to  join  the  Don  and  Volga.  But  he 
forgot  that  commerce  prospers  only  where  there  is  nothing 
to  fear  from  the  caprices  of  suspicious  or  covetous  power. 
He  carried  his  taste  for  European  goods  almost  to  madness, 
but  the  people  rejected  them.  Patterns  of  short  coats  were 
suspended  at  the  gates  of  the  cities,  and  the  beard,  and 
clothes  were  cut  of  whoever  did  not  pay  the  tax  inflicted 
upon  the  obstinate  retainers  of  ancient  costumes. 

In  order  to  encourage  merit  by  distinction  he,  following 
the  example  of  other  European  nations,  founded  an  order 
of  chivalry,  that  of  St.  Andrew.  In  order  to  facilitate  his 
connections  with  the  peoples  of  the  west  he  fixed  by  decree 
the  ist  of  January  as  the  beginning  of  the  year,  instead  of 
the  ist  of  September  (1699).  But  this  was  only  a  partial 
reform:  not  having  adopted  the  Gregorian  calendar,  the 
Russian  year  is  twelve  days  behind  ours. 

Peter  was  wholly  occupied  with  these  reforms.  Pointing 
out  to  his  ministers  and  generals  the  countries  successively 
made  illustrious  by  the  arts  and  learning,  he  was  constantly 
saying  to  them,  "Our  turn  has  come  if  you  are  willing  to 
second  my  designs  and  unite  study  to  obedience,"  when  a 
new  horizon  opened  before  him. 


39°  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

A  Livonian  gentleman,  Reynold  Patkul,  just  then  arrived 
at  the  court  of  Moscow.  He  had  been  condemned  to  death 
in  1692  for  having  demanded  the  re-establishment  of  the 
privileges  of  his  country,  which,  in  violation  of  treaties,  had 
been  destroyed  by  the  King  of  Sweden.  Having  first  taken 
refuge  with  Augustus  II.,  King  of  Poland,  he  came  to  confide 
his  cause  and  his  revenge  to  the  hands  of  the  Czar.  Peter 
did  not  hesitate  to  accept  his  proposals;  reforms  were  to 
him  only  a  means,  the  end  was  the  grandeur  of  Russia,  and 
this  could  be  obtained  only  by  the  humiliation  of  Sweden. 

Since  the  peace  of  Westphalia  Sweden  had  held  the 
supremacy  in  northern  Europe.  She  controlled  the  mouths 
of  all  the  German  rivers — the  VVeser,  the  Elbe,  the  Oder; 
and  as  she  possessed  Pomerania,  Livonia,  Esthonia,  Ingria, 
and  Carelia  with  Finland,  the  Baltic  Sea  was  a  Swedish 
lake.  But  this  brilliant  position  was  menaced.  All  the 
neighboring  peoples  had  either  to  fight  their  way  out  or  to 
pay  back  ancient  defeats.  Russia  could  become  a  Euro- 
pean power  only  by  occupying  the  Gulf  of  Finland,  and  the 
house  of  Brandenburg  wished  to  expel  from  Germany  the 
intruders  who  within  its  sight  had  possession  of  so  goodly  a 
share.  Denmark  had  similar  desires,  and  the  Elector  of 
Saxony,  chosen  King  of  Poland,  welcomed  a  war  in  order 
to  gain  the  right  of  keeping  Saxon  troops  in  that  kingdom, 
which  he  wished  to  render  a  hereditary  possession. 

Charles  XI.,  the  ablest  King  of  Sweden  since  Gustavus 
Adolphus,  died,  leaving  the  throne  to  a  young  prince  of 
eighteen.  Forthwith  a  coalition  was  formed  (1699):  the 
Russians  of  Peter  the  Great  entered  Ingria;  the  Saxons  of 
Augustus  II.,  Livonia;  the  Danes  of  Frederick  III.,  Hoi- 
stein,  whose  duke  was  the  brother-in-law  of  Charles  XII. 

The  new  King  of  Sweden  was  not  a  great  prince,  but  a 
heroic  soul  who,  had  he  possessed  a  little  wisdom,  might 
have  done  great  things.  He  had  carefully  read  Quintus 
Curtius  and  he  desired  nothing  else  so  much  as  to  resemble 
the  Macedonian  hero.  "He  was  not  Alexander,  but  he 
might  have  been  the  first  soldier  of  Alexander." 

At  the  news  of  the  coalition,  far  from  being  surprised  and 
terrified,  he  armed  quickly  and  set  out  to  defend  his  prov- 
inces from  the  attack  of  the  Muscovite  Darius.  He  began 
with  Denmark,  landed  in  the  island  of  Zealand,  and 
marched  straight  to  Copenhagen,  which  he  threatened  with 
bombardment.  The  Danes,  overwhelmed  with  terror,  im- 


CHAP.  XXIV.]  RISE   OF  RUSSIA.  391 

plored  peace  and  hastened  to  sign  the  treaty  of  Traventhal 
(August  18,  1700).  In  six  months  Denmark  had  been 
crushed. 

Already  the  Saxons,  led  by  Patkul,  had  raised  the  siege 
of  Riga  in  consequence  of  the  representations  of  Holland. 
Charles  XII.  hastened  against  the  Russians  and  arrived 
under  the  walls  of  Narva  with  8000  men  to  confront  an 
army  ten  times  more  numerous.  But  the  Czar  had  quitted 
the  camp;  the  generals  did  not  agree  and  inspired  no  con- 
fidence in  their  soldiers.  A  few  hours  sufficed  the  Swedes 
to  throw  this  mob  of  barbarians  headlong  (November  1300). 
Charles  XII.  dismissed  his  prisoners,  whom  he  despised,  and 
marched  against  the  Saxons,  whom  he  found  intrenched 
behind  the  Dwina.  They  were  likewise  beaten  and  lost 
Mitau  and  Courland  (July,  1701). 

Never  had  war  been  made  with  more  lightning  rapidity. 
Unhappily  Charles  XII.  did  not  know  how  to  profit  by  the 
opportunity  and  conclude  a  glorious  peace,  as  the  Chan- 
cellor Oxenstiern  advised,  nor  how  to  recognize  which  of  his 
two  enemies  was  the  more  formidable.  Deceived  by  the 
facile  success  of  Narva,  he  conceived  for  the  Russian 
empire,  and  even  for  Peter  the  Great,  a  contempt  which 
was  the  cause  of  his  disasters.  He  resolved  to  dethrone 
Augustus;  and  leaving  a  few  thousand  men  to  watch  the 
Russians,  he  penetrated  Poland  (1702).  He  there  lost  five 
years  in  winning  barren  victories.  To  make  an  end  he  in- 
vaded Saxony.  Augustus  II.  then  yielded,  and  by  the  treaty 
of  Altranstadt  renounced  formally  the  crown  of  Poland  in 
favor  of  Stanislaus  Leczinski,  the  prottg/  of  the  King  of 
Sweden  (1706). 

Charles  XII.  then  found  himself  the  arbiter  of  Europe. 
The  moment  was  solemn:  if  he  threw  himself  upon  Ger- 
many, and  assailed  in  the  rear  the  allies  who  were  attack- 
ing France,  the  consequences  of  such  a  diversion  were 
incalculable;  hence  Marlborough  himself  came  to  Altran- 
stadt to  negotiate  with  the  King  of  Sweden.  Charles  de- 
manded of  Joseph  I.  a  multitude  of  concessions  and 
reparations:  the  emperor  accorded  everything.  The  allies 
breathed  again  when  Charles  XII.,  quitting  Saxony,  turned 
toward  the  east,  to  there  fight  hand  to  hand  with  an  adver- 
sary who  began  to  cause  him  anxiety. 

While  he  warred  in  Poland  for  the  empty  honor  of  making 
a  king,  Peter  the  Great  had  reorganized  his  army  and 


392  THE   EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

beaten  near  Derpt  7000  Swedes  (September,  1701).  The 
following  year  Peter  conquered  Ingria,  where  in  order  to  be 
master  of  Lake  Ladoga  and  of  the  Neva  he  strengthened 
the  fortifications  of  the  Swedish  strongholds  of  Noteborg, 
which  he  called  Schusselberg,  or  the  Fort  of  the  Key,  say- 
ing that  by  this  key  he  would  open  hostile  countries. 
His  troops  became  accustomed  to  war,  officers  were  devel- 
oped, and  a  succession  of  unpretentious  but  solid  victories, 
such  as  the  capture  of  Derpt,  Narva,  and  Mitau,  inspired 
all  the  necessary  confidence  for  confronting  the  terrible 
soldiers  'of  the  Swedish  hero. 

Decided  at  last,  after  all  this  time  wasted  in  Poland  and 
Saxony,  to  arrest  the  progress  of  an  enemy  whom  he  had 
too  much  despised,  Charles  rapidly  traversed  Saxony  and 
Poland,  driving  before  him  the  Russians  who  had  ventured 
upon  Polish  territory;  he  crossed  the  Beresina  upon  the  ice 
(1708),  and  entered  Mohileff.  He  had  no  plan;  first  he 
seemed  resolved  to  march  upon  Moscow,  while  one  of  his 
generals,  Lubecker,  attacked  St.  Petersburg,  the  infant 
capital  of  Russia.  With  a  little  prudence  this  march  might 
have  succeeded,  and  Peter  in  conquered  Moscow  would 
have  been  compelled  to  accept  the  peace  which  he  had 
many  times  demanded.  But  arrived  at  Smolensk,  Charles 
abandoned  the  road  toward  Moscow  and  directed  his  course 
southward.  Before  him  he  saw  Scheremetoff  retreating, 
the  most  skillful  general  of  the  Czar,  and  he  gave  pursuit. 
Scheremetoff  laid  waste  everything  in  his  march,  destroyed 
the  forage,  burned  the  magazines,  and  desolated  the  fields 
to  starve  the  enemy. 

Charles  XII.,  lost  in  the  midst  of  deserts,  continued 
nevertheless  to  advance;  he  counted  upon  an  insurrection 
of  the  Cossacks  of  the  Ukraine  in  order  to  cut  off  the 
retreat  of  Scheremetoff.  He  had  concluded  an  alliance 
with  their  hetman,  Mazeppa.  Unfortunately  the  army 
lost  its  way  in  the  pathless  marshes  of  Pinsk,  and  Charles 
reached  the  rendezvous  too  late.  The  Czar  had  had  time  to 
beat  Mazeppa,  and  the  hetman  brought  the  king  only  a 
handful  of  troops  (1708).  Charles  XII.  counted  at  least 
on  Lewenhaupt,  who  was  approaching  with  16,000  men  and 
immense  stores.  The  Czar  threw  himself  between  the  king 
and  his  lieutenant.  Lewenhaupt,  attacked  by  60,000  men 
near  the  Soja,  an  eastern  affluent  of  the  Dnieper,  resisted 
heroically,  and  after  five  murderous  engagements  was  com- 


CHAP.  XXIV.]  RISE   OF  RUSSIA.  393 

pelled  to  set  fire  to  the  7000  wagons  he  was  escorting; 
he  rejoined  the'  king  with  only  5000  men,  leaving  44 
standards  in  the  hands  of  the  Czar.  "This  victory,"  said 
Peter,  "was  the  mother  of  Pultowa."  At  the  same  time 
Apraxin  defeated  a  Swedish  corps  in  Ingria.  Then  came 
the  terrible  winter  of  1709:  in  a  single  march  2000  soldiers 
fell  dead.  The  army  lost  half  of  its  effective  force. 

Peter  the  Great  maneuvered,  however,  with  equal  ability 
and  prudence  to  confine  the  Swedes  in  the  Ukraine;  Charles 
XII.  endeavored  vainly  to  break  through  by  partial  attacks; 
his  detachments  were  beaten.  He  then  determined  to 
besiege  Pultowa,  where  the  Czar  had  his  magazines ;  the  city 
possessed  only  walls  of  earth.  Peter  the  Great  arrived  at 
the  head  of  70,000  men  and  intrenched  himself  in  a  formi- 
dable position.  Charles,  after  having  lost  two  months  at 
the  siege,  had  no  resource  left  save  to  give  battle.  Not- 
withstanding all  the  valor  of  his  soldiers,  he  was  defeated 
and  his  army  captured  or  destroyed.  He  himself  fled  to 
Turkey  with  500  horsemen  (1709). 

This  victory  overthrew  the  power  of  Sweden  and  trans- 
ferred to  Russia  the  supremacy  in  northern  Europe.     The 
Charles    xii.   Czar,  who  at  Pultowa  had  fought  as  a  common 
at    Bender:   soldier,  knew  as  a  skillful  general  how  to  profit 

treaties    of    the     ,         ,  .    '  /->         v         T  •  • 

Pruth  (1711)  and  by  his  victory:  he  seized  Carelia,  Livonia, 
Nystadt  (1721).  and  Esthonia,  and  called  to  arms  all  those 
whom  Charles  had  conquered.  The  King  of  Denmark 
fell  upon  Scania,  and  Augustus  II.  re-entered  Poland. 
The  Divan  was  alarmed  at  seeing  a  power  born  yester- 
day increase  so  fast;  it  yielded  to  the  entreaties  of  the 
King  of  Sweden,  and  declared  war  against  Russia.  The 
grand  vizier,  Mohammed  Baltadji,  crossed  the  Danube.  The 
Czar,  invited  by  the  hospodars  of  Moldavia  and  Wallachia, 
marched  against  the  Ottomans,  but  could  not  defend  the 
passage  of  the  Pruth,  and  found  himself  with  his  40,000 
men  destitute  of  food  and  ammunition,  surrounded  by 
150,000  enemies.  The  Czarina  Catherine,  a  young  Livo- 
nian,  widow  of  a  Dutch  dragoon,  made  prisoner  by  the 
Russians  in  Marienburg  (1702),  whom  the  Czar  captivated 
by  her  beauty  and  intelligence  had  espoused,  delivered  him 
by  herself  opening  negotiations  with  the  grand  vizier,  who 
allowed  himself  to  be  won  over.  The  Czar  restored  Azof; 
by  the  destruction  of  the  port  of  Taganrog  he  renounced 
the  idea  of  opening  up  the  Black  Sea ;  he  also  agreed  to 


394  THE  EIGHTEENTH   CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

have  his  troops  evacuate  Poland  and  to  no  longer  interfere 
in  the  affairs  of  that  republic.  Charles  by  this  treaty  was 
a  second  time  conquered.  He  persisted  through  three 
years  in  remaining  in  Turkey,  putting  in  play  a  thousand 
springs  in  order  to  rouse  the  Sultan  against  the  Czar.  He 
could  not  succeed.  Tired  by  his  intrigues,  the  Divan 
wished  to  compel  him  to  quit  the  Ottoman  territory. 
Charles  XII.  defended  himself  at  Bender  with  his  domestics 
and  officers  against  15,000  men.  When  he  decided  to 
depart  in  1714  it  was  too  late. 

To  no  purpose  he  had  wasted  three  years  in  those  heroic 
freaks,  and  meanwhile  Sweden  had  lost  all  its  foreign  prov- 
inces. In  vain  Steinach  had  in  1709  destroyed  the  Danish 
army  near  Helsingborg;  he  was,  despite  a  second  victory, 
compelled  to  capitulate  in  Tonningen  at  the  mouth  of  the 
Eider  (1713).  Peter  sent  into  Pomerania  Mentschikoff, 
formerly  a  pastrycook's  boy,  whom  he  had  made  general 
and  prince,  and  who  deserved  his  honors.  With  the  fleet 
which  he  had  created  he  himself  gained,  near  the  Aland 
Islands,  a  naval  battle  over  the  Swedes,  the  ancient  masters 
of  the  Baltic,  which  gave  him  Finland.  The  King  of  Den- 
mark sold  to  George  I.,  King  of  England,  Bremen  and 
Verden,  which  he  had  seized.  The  King  of  Prussia  caused 
Stettin  and  Pomerania  to  be  surrendered  to  himself.  The 
spoils  of  Sweden  were  at  auction. 

At  that  moment  Charles  XII.  finally  decided  to  depart 
from  Turkey:  he  crossed  all  Germany  on  horseback  in  dis- 
guise and  stopped  only  at  Stralsund,  the  last  city  which  he 
possessed  outside  of  Sweden.  A  combined  army  of  Danes, 
Saxons,  Prussians,  and  Russians  at  once  besieged  him 
there;  he  defended  it  a  month  and  was  compelled  to  aban- 
don the  city  so  as  not  to  be  captured  on  its  surrender.  It 
capitulated  that  same  day  (December  13,  1715). 

Agriculture  and  manufactures  ruined,  commerce  annihi- 
lated, 250,000  men,  the  flower  of  the  nation,  cut  off  by  a 
fifteen  years'  war,  the  ancient  ascendency  lost — such  was  the 
situation  to  which  Charles  XII.  had  reduced  his  kingdom, 
and  in  which  he  refound  it.  He,  however,  gave  no  sign 
that  the  past  had  at  least  served  him  as  a  lesson.  He  con- 
sented only,  following  the  counsels  of  Baron  de  Goertz,  to 
divide  his  enemies;  a  tacit  truce  was  concluded  between 
Sweden  and  the  Czar;  Goertz  even  had  an  understanding 
with  Alberoni,  and  Charles  XII.  promised  to  lead  20,000 


CHAP.  XXIV.]  RISE   OF  RUSSIA.  395 

men  into  England  to  dethrone  George  I.  First  he  attacked 
Denmark  and  invaded  Norway,  but  he  perished  before 
Frederickshall,  probably  by  assassination  (December  n, 
1718).  Three  months  later  Baron  de  Goertz  died  upon 
the  scaffold.  Charles  XII.  had  twice  missed  the  oppor- 
tunity of  filling  a  grand  role:  in  1707  that  of  a  Gustavus 
Adolphus  in  the  complications  of  western  Europe;  later 
that  of  a  triumphant  peacemaker  in  conquered  Poland  and 
Russia.  He  had  believed  himself  a  second  Alexander,  he 
had  been  only  a  brave  adventurer;  he  had  destroyed  the 
prosperity  of  his  people  and  ruined  his  country  for  a 
century. 

The  sister  of  Charles  XII.,  Ulrica  Eleanora,  was  chosen 
by  the  States  to  succeed  him  (January  31,  1720),  but  upon 
the  condition  of  signing  a  formal  agreement  which  peculiarly 
restricted  the  royal  authority.  She  made  joint  ruler  with 
herself  (April  4,  1720)  her  husband,  Frederick  of  Hesse- 
Cassel,  and  by  onerous  treaties  re-established  peace  among 
the  northern  states.  Sweden  recognized  Augustus  II.  as 
King  of  Poland,  retained  Wismar  in  Mecklenburg,  but  kept 
of  Pomerania  only  what  is  north  of  the  Peene  (Stralsund), 
ceded  to  Prussia,  together  with  the  islands  of  Usedom  and 
Wollin,  the  part  of  that  province  comprised  between  the 
Peene  and  the  Oder  (Stettin),  and  confirmed  Denmark  in  the 
possession  of  Schleswig.  The  treaty  of  Nystadt  with  Russia 
(1721)  cost  her  all  the  countries  bathed  by  the  gulfs  of  Riga 
and  Finland  from  the  Duna  as  far  as  the  Kymene,  that  is 
to  say,  Livonia,  Esthonia,  Ingria,  a  part  of  Carelia,  of  the 
country  of  Viborg,  and  eastern  Finland.  When  the  ambas- 
sador of  France  entreated  less  harsh  terms  for  Sweden  Peter 
replied,  "I  do  not  wish  to  see  from  my  windows  the  lands 
of  my  neighbor." 

Sweden  declined,  Russia  ascended.     In  1716  Peter  had 

taken   advantage   of   the   negotiations   opened    by     Baron 

Goertz  to  make  a  new   journey  to   Europe. 

ne^eCo°fnpeterUto   He  already  thought  of  obtaining  a  foothold 

Europe    (1716);    in  Germany;  this  gave  umbrage  to  the  Elector 

St.  Petersburg  ;,T,  v       u    j   i  V  ft? 

the  Czar  chief  of  Hanover,  who  had  become  King  of  Eng- 
church. Russian  land.  In  order  to  succeed  in  this  design  he 
needed  the  friendship  of  France,  and  he  said 
with  great  justice  to  the  French  agents:  "You  have  used 
Sweden  to  check  Austria.  The  former  power  is  ruined; 
I  offer  myself  in  her  place  if  you  guarantee  me  my 


39  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

conquests  and  pay  me  the  subsidies  which  you  gave  to 
Sweden;  furthermore,  I  bring  you  the  alliance  of  Poland 
and  Prussia."  Dubois,  the  confidant  of  the  Regent  of 
France  and  an  ardent  partisan  of  the  English  alliance, 
did  all  in  his  power  to  hinder  this  negotiation,  which, 
however,  resulted  in  the  treaty  of  Amsterdam,  whereby 
France,  the  Czar,  and  Prussia  guaranteed  the  treaties 
of  Utrecht  and  Baden,  as  well  as  those  which  should 
be  concluded  for  the  peace  of  the  north  by  the  Czar  and 
Prussia.  This  agreement  was  the  abandonment  of  Sweden, 
the  ancient  ally  of  France.  The  Czar  devoted  six 
months  to  visiting  France  and  its  marvels.  He  received 
the  most  magnificent  hospitality;  he  was  made  to  accept 
everything  which  he  admired  in  matters  of  art.  He  visited 
the  mint;  one  of  the  medals  which  had  been  struck  in  his 
presence  fell  to  the  ground;  he  picked  it  up  and  saw  his 
portrait  with  this  legend:  "Vires  acquirit  eundo." 

Returning  to  his  states,  he  completed  his  new  capital  to 
replace  the  ancient  Moscow,  which  he  considered  too 
remote  from  Europe  and  too  Asiatic.  He  had  laid  its 
foundation  in  1703  on  the  ruined  bastions  of  the  city  of 
Nieuschantz,  captured  that  same  year  from  the  Swedes,  and 
he  called  it  St.  Petersburg,  after  his  own  name.  The  situa- 
tion was  well  chosen,  thirty  versts  distant  from  the  mouth 
of  the  Neva,  near  the  Gulf  of  Finland,  and  confronting 
Sweden.  The  place  was  unhealthy;  more  than  100,000 
workmen  perished;  but  the  Czar  did  not  reckon  the  dead. 
He  took  up  his  quarters  in  the  midst  of  the  laborers,  had 
earth  brought  to  fill  the  marshes  and  canals  dug  to  carry 
away  the  stagnant  waters.  One  of  the  most  beautiful  capitals 
of  Europe  rose  by  the  invincible  will  of  its  founder  in  a  spot 
where  Nature  would  hardly  have  located  a  village.  As 
early  as  the  year  1704  the  city  was  protected  from  sudden 
attack  by  sea  by  the  construction  of  the  fortress  of  Kron- 
slott  on  an  island  at  the  mouth  of  the  Neva ;  and  the  harbor 
of  Kronstadt,  excavated  in  1710  from  a  bank  of  sand  in  the 
Gulf  of  Finland,  received  the  infant  navy  of  the  Czar. 

St.  Petersburg,  hardly  built,  saw  rise  within  it  a  glass 
factory,  a  carpet  manufactory,  and  another  of  gold  and  silver 
thread.  Peter  had  already  caused  shepherds  and  flocks  to 
come  from  Saxony  and  Poland  that  he  might  have  wools 
suitable  for  the  making  of  good  cloth  and  be  no  longer 
obliged  to  depend  upon  the  manufactures  of  Berlin  to  clothe 


CHAP.  XXIV.]  JKISE   OF  RUSSIA.  397 

his  troops;  he  furthermore  invited  from  abroad  workmen 
in  iron  and  brass,  gunsmiths,  and  founders ;  at  his  death 
Moscow  and  Yaroslav  contained  fourteen  manufactories  of 
linen  and  hempen  cloth.  To  facilitate  interchange  he  made 
weights  and  measures  uniform,  and  established  a  chamber 
of  commerce  composed  half  of  foreigners,  half  of  Russians. 
At  the  same  time  the  mines  of  Siberia  were  opened;  the 
Baltic,  Black,  and  Caspian  seas  were  bound  together  by 
canals,  the  banks  of  Lake  Peipus  converted  into  dockyards; 
the  plan  of  the  canal  and  locks  of  the  Ladoga  was  outlined 
by  Peter  himself  in  1718.  Forts,  erected  at  equal  distances, 
protected  the  frontier  against  the  Tartars.  Commercial 
relations  were  established  with  China;  an  attempt  was  made 
to  open  a  new  route  to  the  products  of  India  through  Great 
Bokhara,  and  to  those  of  Persia  by  the  Caspian  Sea,  so  as 
to  put  all  this  lucrative  commerce  into  the  hands  of  Russia. 
Forts  were  built  as  far  as  Kamtchatka,  and  Behring  sur- 
veyed the  coasts  of  eastern  Siberia  (1725),  where  he  was 
shortly  to  discover  the  strait  which  bears  his  name  (1728). 

The  Russian  clergy  was  famous  for  its  ignorance ;  its 
members  knew  hardly  more  than  two  things:  that  they  were 
of  the  Greek  religion,  and  that  they  must  hate  the  Latins. 
Peter  obliged  them  to  recruit  their  ranks  in  three  colleges 
which  he  established  at  Moscow.  He  took  away  from 
ecclesiastical  jurisdiction  the  right  of  condemnation  to  capi- 
tal punishment  or  to  severe  penalties,  and  authorized 
monastic  vows  only  after  the  age  of  fifty.  He  had  allowed 
the  patriarchal  throne  to  remain  vacant  since  1703;  he 
abolished  it  formally  in  1721,  and  gave  the  supreme  direc- 
tion of  religious  affairs  to  the  Holy  Synod,  a  council  com- 
posed of  twelve  bishops  or  archimandrites  whom  he 
appointed  and  who  swore  fidelity  to  him.  He  thus  became 
in  reality  supreme  head  of  religion,  which  he  subordinated 
entirely  to  the  interests  and  actions  of  the  temporal  authority. 
In  his  laws  he  punished  with  the  same  penalties  blasphemies 
against  God  and  murmurs  against  himself. 

But  Peter  was  not  satisfied  with  fortifying  the  autocratic 
principle  of  the  Russian  government;  he  modified  its 
nature.  He  in  fact  applied  the  system  of  military  hierarchy 
to  all  the  administration  of  the  empire,  declaring  that  offi- 
cers should  possess  personal  nobility  and  superior  officers 
hereditary  nobility.  The  Russian  people  gradually  became 
a  regiment  of  mutes,  and,  as  says  a  modern  traveler,  "the 


398  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

discipline  of  the  camp  was  substituted  for  the  order  of  the 
city." 

His  first  wife,  Eudoxia  Lapoutchin,  Peter  had  repudiated 
because  of  her  opposition  to  his  reforms.  She  had  borne  him 
a  son,  Alexis  Petrovitch,  chief  of  the  discontented  party, 
who,  governed  by  the  priests  and  embittered  against  his 
father  and  his  stepmother  Catherine,  one  day  had  said:  "If 
I  find  an  opportunity  when  my  father  is  not  present  I  shall 
say  something  to  the  archbishops,  who  will  repeat  it  to  the 
curates,  and  the  curates  will  repeat  it  to  their  parishioners, 
and  it  may  be  they  will  make  me  reign  in  spite  of  myself." 
And  he  would  have  reigned,  as  all  the  world  well  under- 
stood, to  annul  his  father's  work,  to  permit  the  wearing  of  the 
long  beard  and  the  Asiatic  robes,  to  re-establish  the  patri- 
arch and  the  three  fasts,  to  banish  the  foreigners  and  the 
reforms.  The  intrigues  of  Alexis  made  the  Czar  anxious; 
he  several  times  had  him  warned,  then  arrested,  and  then 
brought  him  before  an  exceptional  tribunal  of  121  commis- 
sioners, who,  after  having  subjected  him  to  the  rack,  unani- 
mously condemned  him  to  death.  At  the  news  of  the  deci- 
sion the  prince  fell  into  convulsions,  which  according  to  the 
courtiers  brought  about  an  attack  of  apoplexy.  The  follow- 
ing day  he  died*  (1718).  The  Englishman  Henry  Bruce, 
then  present  in  Russia,  wrote  home  that  the  Czar  had 
administered  a  potion  to  his  son  which  caused  his  death  in 
convulsions.  Very  few  people,  he  added,  considered  his 
death  as  natural,  but  it  was  dangerous  to  say  what  one 
thought.  Many  of  his  supposed  accomplices  perished; 
General  Gleboff  was  impaled,  the  Archbishop  of  Rostoff 
was  broken  alive  upon  the  wheel,  the  Empress  Eudoxia  was 
flogged. 

The  man  who  did  not  pardon  his  son  would  not  be  greatly 
inclined  to  pardon  his  unfaithful  agents.  Extortion,  that 
curse  of  the  Russian  administration,  found  the  Czar  pitiless. 
In  1721  the  Governor  of  Archangel  was  shot;  the  Vice- 

*  It  was  proved  that  the  Czarevitch  Alexis  was  the  center  of  a  vast  plot 
not  only  against  his  father's  reforms  but  against  his  throne  and  life.  For 
this  end  he  had  solicited  the  armed  assistance  of  the  Austrian  emperor 
and  had  sought  help  from  Sweden.  In  the  eyes  of  Peter  he  was  not  so 
much  a  rebellious  son  as  a  "  traitor  to  his  country,  the  chief  of  her 
domestic  enemies  and  the  ally  of  all  her  foreign  foes."  Still  the  manner 
of  his  death,  whether  it  was  natural  or  by  violence,  has  remained  to  the 
present,  and  will  probably  always  remain,  an  impenetrable  mystery. — ED. 


CHAP.  XXIV.]  RISE    OF  RUSSIA.  399 

governor  of  St.  Petersburg  was  beaten  with  the  knout  for 
having  abused  his  power.  Some  time  before  a  chamber  of 
justice,  instituted  to  re-establish  order  in  the  finances,  had 
even  caused  the  favorite  of  the  Czar,  Prince  Mentschikoff, 
to  tremble.  By  this  merciless  harshness  Peter  succeeded,  as 
he  himself  said,  in  clothing  his  herd  of  wild  beasts  like  men. 

The  last  years  of  the  Czar  were  also  marked  by  successes. 
He  had  then  a  regular  army  of  120,000  men  and  a  fleet  of 
30  ships  of  the  line.  He  had  won  by  conquest  predomi- 
nance in  the  north;  the  treaty  of  Nystadt  ratified  this 
supremacy.  An  expedition  against  Persia  brought  him 
Derbent  south  of  the  Caucasus  (1722).  Thus  Peter  I.  had 
pointed  out  to  his  successors  the  double  route  they  have  so 
boldly  followed  toward  the  west  and  south  of  their  empire. 
Under  his  despotic  but  powerful  hand  Russia  was  impelled 
toward  progress  with  violence,  but  with  rapidity.  Three 
years  later  this  civilizing  genius  of  Russia,  whom  the  senate 
and  the  synod  had  surnamed  the  Great  and  the  Father  of 
his  Country,  died  from  the  consequences  of  his  debauches* 
(February  8,  1725).  Voltaire  called  him  half  hero,  half 
tiger,  and  Frederick  II.  said  of  him  and  his  Russians, '  'Aqua 
fortis  which  eats  into  the  iron." 

Few  sovereigns  after  death  have  exerted  equal  influence 
over  their  people.  This  in  the  case  of  Peter  has  not  been 
simply  the  result  of  work  accomplished  during  his  lifetime 
but  in  consequence  of  the  reverence  paid  to  his  memory 
and  hence  to  his  supposed  wishes  and  plans.  Even  peas- 
ants cherish  his  name  in  their  ballads  and  common  tradi- 
tions, and  important  action  has  more  than  once  been 
determined  by  the  argument  that,  in  like  circumstances, 
Peter  would  have  done  thus  and  so.  Russia's  tendency 
toward  expansion  on  the  east  and  south  is  sometimes  re- 

*  According  to  Russian  history  Peter's  death  was  brought  about  in  a 
very  different  way.  Seeing  a  boat  capsize  in  the  floating  ice,  he  plunged 
into  the  water  to  rescue  a  drowning  woman.  He  caught  a  violent  cold, 
which  was  aggravated  by  his  obstinacy  in  attending  the  Orthodox  cere- 
mony of  the  Baptism  of  the  Waters  (January  18),  and  which  resulted  in 
his  death  three  weeks  after  at  the  age  of  fifty-three.  His  last  words  are 
reported  to  have  been  :  "I  trust  God  will  pardon  my  sins  in  view  of  the 
good  I  have  endeavored  to  do  my  people."  A  character  of  the  wildest 
and  most  extravagant  contradictions,  he  can  be  judged  fairly  only  as  the 
disadvantages  of  his  youth  and  the  dominant  purpose  of  his  life  are  taken 
into  account.  lie  is  one  of  the  three  foremost  men,  if  not  himself  the 
foremost,  of  modern  times. — ED. 


400  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY. 

garded,  even  by  Russians,  as  not  only  natural  and  inev- 
itable but  as  obedience  to  the  designs  of  the  Great  Czar.* 
Europeans  have  believed  that  he  formulated  with  his  own 
hand  the  outline  of  a  course  of  action  for  his  successors,  and 
that  the  impulse  given  almost  two  hundred  years  ago  has  de- 
termined the  subsequent  course  of  Russia's  foreign  history. 

*  There  is  hardly  a  more  interesting  subject  for  historical  curiosity  than 
the  genuineness  and  authenticity  of  this  so-called  "Testament  of  Peter 
the  Great."  The  two  most  opposite  theories  have  been,  (i)  that  it  is 
genuine,  traced  by  Peter's  own  hand,  and  (2)  that  it  was  forged  in  1811  by 
Lesur  under  the  dictation  of  Napoleon,  and  first  published  in  1812,  in 
Lesur's  "  Des  Progres  de  la  Puissance  russe  depuis  son  Origine  jusqu'au 
Commencement  du  XlXme.  Siecle."  The  first  theory  has  been  dis- 
proved; the  second,  while  not  disproved,  has  the  balance  of  argument 
against  it.  The  existence  of  a  somewhat  similar  document  as  early  as 
1760  is,  however,  almost  demonstrated.  In  many  respects  the  policy 
advocated  in  the  "testament"  has  generally  been  that  of  the  Russian 
government.  Such  a  policy  would  be  the  natural  result  of  Russia's 
geographical  position  and  of  the  spirit  of  her  people.  At  the  same  time 
the  internal  evidence  of  the  language  employed,  as  notably  in  the  ninth 
paragraph,  would  demonstrate  that  this  document  was  not  of  Russian 
but  of  foreign  origin. 

The  following  is  the  text  of  this  remarkable  paper : 

1.  To  neglect  no  means  of  giving  the  Russian  nation  European  forms 
and  usages. 

2.  To  maintain  the  state  in  constant  war. 

3.  To  extend  by  all  possible  means  toward  the  north  along  the  Baltic, 
toward  the  south  along  the  Black  Sea. 

4.  To  fan  the  jealousy  of  England,  Denmark,  and  Brandenburg  against 
Sweden,  which   will  finally   be   subjugated  ;    to  interest   the    house  of 
Austria  in  driving  the  Turks  from   Europe,  and  under  this   pretext  to 
maintain  a  standing  army,  to  establish  dockyards  on  the  Black  Sea,  and, 
always  advancing,  at  last  reach  Constantinople. 

5.  To  encourage   the  anarchy  of  Poland   and  finally  subjugate  that 
republic. 

6.  To  maintain   by  a  commercial  treaty  an  intimate    alliance    with 
England,  who  for  its  part  will  favor  every  project  for  the  enlargement 
and  perfecting  of  the  Russian  navy,  by  means  of  which  domination  on  the 
Black  Sea  and  the  Baltic  will  be  obtained. 

7.  To  realize  this  truth  :    that  the  commerce  of  the  Indies  is  the  com- 
merce of  the  world,  and  that  whoever  monopolizes  it  is  the  sovereign  of 
Europe. 

8.  To  mix  up  at  whatever  cost  in  the  quarrels  of  Europe,  and  above  all 
of  Germany. 

9.  To  employ  the  ascendency  of  religion  among  the  separated  or  schis- 
matic Greeks  scattered  in   Hungary,  Turkey,  and  the  southern  parts   of 
Poland. 

10.  To  set  against  each  other  the  courts  of  France  and  Austria  as  well 
as  their  allies,  and  to  take  advantage  of  their  mutual  feebleness  to  invade 
all.— ED. 


CHAPTER  XXV. 

CREATION     OF     PRUSSIA.— HUMILIATION     OF     FRANCE 
AND  AUSTRIA. 


Regency  of  the  Duke  of  Orleans  ;  Ministries  of  Dubois,  of  the  Duke  of 
Bourbon,  and  of  Fleury  (1715-43). — Formation  of  Prussia  and  Situ- 
ation of  Austria. — War  of  the  Austrian  Succession  (1741-48). — The 
Seven  Years'  War  (1756-63). 


THE  successor  of  Louis  XIV.  in  France  was  only  five 
years  old,  Parliament  conferred  the  regency  with  all  the 
of  Povver  uPon  the  Duke  of  Orleans,  nephew  of 
theefjukeyof  Or-  the  dead  king,  an  intelligent  and  brave  prince, 
trfesfof  D^bols"  but  good-natured  even  to  weakness  and 
of  the  Duke  of  shamefully  dissolute.  To  gain  Parliament  he 

Bourbon,  and  of  •       j    •..  i  j.i  j 

Fieury  (1715-43.).  promised  it  a  share  in  the  government,  and 
some  time  after  he  sent  it  into  exile  at  Pon- 
toise  because  the  magistrates  were  opposed  to  the  experi- 
ments of  Law  upon  the  national  property.  He  appeared 
at  first  decided  to  re-establish  harmony  in  religious  affairs 
by  practicing  general  toleration.  But  soon  he  declared 
himself  in  favor  of  the  Jesuits  and  had  the  bull  Unigeni- 
tus  registered,  which  was  directed  against  the  Jansenists, 
his  sole  motive  being  that  his  principal  agent,  the  Abbe 
Dubois,  already  made  Archbishop  of  Cambrai  in  spite  of 
his  unfitness,  might  obtain  a  cardinal's  hat.  To  remedy 
the  bureaucratic  despotism  which  the  ministers  had  ex- 
ercised under  Louis  XIV.  he  replaced  them  by  special 
councils  composed  of  nobles;  less  than  two  years  after  he 
suppressed  these  councils. 

Two  events  fill  this  sad  period:  abroad,  a  war  against 
Spain ;  at  home,  the  financiering  of  Law. 

If  Louis  XIV.  had  fought  fourteen  years  against  Europe 
it  was  not  merely  to  bestow  a  kingdom  upon  his  grandson  ; 
it  was  in  order  to  render  Spain  an  ally  of  France.  The 
Duke  of  Orleans  sacrificed  the  ties  of  family,  the  honor  and 


4°2  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

the  interests  of  the  country,  to  the  possibility  of  his  becom- 
ing King  of  France  in  case  the  child  king  then  reigning 
should  die.  For  this  purpose  he  formed  an  intimate  union 
with  George  I.,  King  of  England.  The  latter,  menaced  by 
Jacobites  and  Tories,  felt  that  his  power  was  poorly  estab- 
lished. Peace  was  indispensable  would  he  give  stability  to 
his  new  and  tottering  throne.  Happily  for  the  Hanoverian 
dynasty  foreign  affairs  in  France  were  in  the  hands  of 
Dubois.  This  man,  whose  scandalous  promotion  hardly 
astonished  his  contemporaries,  openly  received  an  annual 
pension  from  George  I.  Thanks  to  the  corruption  of  "the 
droll,"  as  the  Abbe"  Dubois  was  called  by  the  regent,  France 
received  rather  than  imposed  the  conditions  of  the  alliance. 
She  promised  to  banish  from  her  territory  the  pretender 
James  Stuart,  to  demolish  Mardeck,  and  to  fill  up  the  harbor 
of  Dunkirk. 

The  policy  of  the  Spanish  government  drew  still  closer 
the  bonds  which  united  England  and  France.  Alberoni, 
prime  minister  of  Philip  V.,  wished  to  restore  to  Spain  the 
territories  of  which  the  treaty  of  Utrecht  had  deprived  her; 
to  succeed  therein  he  did  not  hesitate  to  risk  a  general  con- 
flagration. Austria,  France,  and  England  had  united  for 
the  maintenance  of  the  treaty  of  Utrecht.  Alberoni  under- 
took to  keep  Austria  busy  with  the  Ottomans,  to  overthrow 
the  regent  by  a  conspiracy,  and  to  re-establish  the  Stuarts 
by  the  sword  of  Charles  XII.  But  Prince  Eugene  defeated 
the  Ottomans  at  Peterwardein  and  Belgrade  (1710-17); 
the  conspiracy  of  Cellamare  and  the  Duchess  of  Maine  was 
a  failure  (1718);  Charles  XII.  perished  in  Norway  (1718). 
Then  the  regent  declared  war  against  Spain.  "This  was  a 
civil  war,"  said  Voltaire;  it  was  above  all  an  absurd  war; 
for  France  fought  against  Spain,  her  natural  ally,  to  the 
great  joy  of  England,  who  at  that  time  was  still  her  natural 
enemy.  Philip  V.  was  careful  to  have  the  three  lilies 
emblazoned  on  all  the  standards  of  his  army.  The  same 
Marshal  Berwick  who  had  gained  battles  to  establish 
Philip's  throne  commanded  the  French  army.  The  Eng- 
lish destroyed  a  Spanish  fleet  near  Messina  and  captured 
Vigo  in  Galicia;  then  all  the  schemes  of  Cardinal  Alberoni 
having  come  to  nought,  this  minister,  who  for  six  months 
had  been  considered  the  greatest  of  statesmen,  was  regarded 
only  as  a  headstrong  blunderer.  He  was  obliged  to  quit 
the  ministry,  and  Spain  adhered  to  the  quadruple  alliance 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  4°3 

which  France,  Great  Britain,  Holland,  and  Austria  had 
concluded.  The  Duke  of  Savoy  received  Sardinia  in 
exchange  for  Sicily,  which  was  left  to  the  emperor.  The 
Queen  of  Spain  obtained  for  the  eldest  of  her  children 
promise  of  survivorship  to  the  duchies  of  Parma,  Piacenza, 
and  Tuscany  (1720). 

The  peace  established  had  no  solid  basis  and  was  pre- 
carious. Spain  still  cherished  the  hope  of  recovering  her 
former  possessions.  She  sought  success  by  diplomacy; 
then  commenced  complicated  negotiations,  wherein  the  dif- 
ferent cabinets  of  Europe  showed  astonishing  versatility. 
The  treaties  of  Prado,  Seville,  and  Vienna  (1728,  1729, 
1731)  at  last  reconciled  everybody.  The  duchies  promised 
to  Spain  were  guaranteed,  and  in  1731  the  infante  Don 
Carlos  took  possession  of  those  of  Parma  and  Piacenza; 
the  pragmatic  sanction  of  the  emperor  Charles  VI. — of 
which  we  shall  speak  later  on — was  accepted ;  finally,  the 
Ostend  Company,  established  by  that  prince  to  compete 
with  the  English  and  Dutch  in  the  East  Indies,  was  aban- 
doned to  itself  and  fell  to  pieces. 

The  saddest  legacy  bequeathed  by  the  reign  of  Louis 
XIV.  was  the  financial  ruin.  The  State  owed  2,400,000,000 
francs,  one-third  of  which  was  immediately  due.  The  next 
two  years'  revenue  had  been  spent.  On  imposts  amounting 
to  165,000,000  francs  the  treasury  received  69,000,000  while 
expending  147,000,000;  deficit,  78,000,000.  The  regent 
at  first  endeavored  to  correct  the  evil  by  remedies  in  detail, 
such  as  suppression  of  offices,  reduction  of  interest,  a  court 
of  judicature  for  the  revenue  farmers;  but  these  tyrannical 
or  insufficient  measures  only  ruined  credit.  St.  Simon 
advised  convening  the  States  General  that  they  might  decree 
bankruptcy.  The  regent  rejected  this  remedy,  not  as 
immoral,  but  as  dangerous.  He  preferred  to  adopt  the  plans 
of  the  Scotchman  Law. 

This  daring  financier,  compelled  to  flee  from  Great  Britain 
on  account  of  a  duel,  had  first  proposed  his  project  to  the 
Duke  of  Savoy,  who  replied  he  was  not  strong  enough  to 
ruin  himself.  He  had  then  offered  it  to  the  controller 
general,  Desmarets ;  but  this  was  during  a  disastrous  war 
when  all  confidence  was  lost,  and  the  basis  of  Law's  system 
was  confidence.  He  was  more  successful  with  the  regent. 
He  wished  to  create  a  new  power,  credit,  taking  as  his  basis 
a  principle  which  is  only  half  true:  that  abundance  of  specie 


4°4  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CE.\'TL'RY.         [BOOK  VI. 

causes  the  prosperity  of  commerce  and  manufactures; 
thence  he  drew  the  absolutely  false  consequence  that  it  is 
advantageous  to  substitute  for  hard  currency,  which  cannot 
be  indefinitely  created,  paper  currency  or  paper  money, 
which  can  be  multiplied  indefinitely.  Law  at  the  beginning 
limited  himself  to  founding  a  private  bank.  The  bank  at 
first,  at  an  annual  rate  of  6  per  cent.,  and  soon  at  4  per 
cent.,  discounted  commercial  bills  which  before  that  time 
found  takers  only  by  paying  2^  per  cent,  monthly;  the 
bank  itself  also  issued  bills  which  it  paid  at  sight  in  specie 
of  invariable  weight  and  value.  Afterward  everybody 
rushed  thither  and  contended  for  its  paper,  whereby  com- 
mercial transactions  were  facilitated  in  a  marked  degree. 

To  his  bank,  which  became  in  1718  the  Royal  Bank,  Law 
added  a  commercial  company,  which  obtained  the  exclusive 
privilege  of  the  working  and  commerce  of  Louisiana  and  of 
the  entire  Mississippi  Valley,  then  of  Senegal  and  the  Indies. 
The  first  success  of  Law  made  men  believe  in  the  second. 
Such  were  the  foolish  hopes  built  upon  this  enterprise  that 
shares  emitted  at  500  francs  were  bought  at  ten,  twenty, 
thirty,  and  forty  times  their  nominal  value. 

The  Rue  Quincampoix,  in  which  the  Royal  Bank  was 
situated,  overflowed  with  a  crowd  of  people,  pressing  upon 
each  other  to  suffocation.  Paris,  all  France,  and  foreigners 
even  hurried  thither,  thirsty  for  gain.  All  classes  gave 
themselves  up  to  frenzied  speculation.  Enormous  profits 
were  made  in  an  instant.  He  who  in  the  morning  was  a 
valet  in  the  evening  found  himself  a  master. 

However,  the  bank  attained  its  end;  it  lent  the  state 
1,200,000,000  francs  in  paper  money,  with  which  it  repaid 
its  creditors,  and  which  then  returned  to  the  bank  in 
exchange  for  shares  in  the  company.  But  there  must  be  a 
loss  somewhere ;  it  was  the  nation  which  sustained  it.  In 
vain  Law  wished  to  moderate  the  emission  of  paper;  he 
was  no  longer  able:  to  sustain  the  prodigious  movement  of 
commerce,  and  to  satisfy  so  many  rapacious  appetites,  it  was 
necessary  to  create  and  keep  on  creating  paper  values; 
these  exceeded  3,000,000,000  francs  at  a  time  when  all  the 
specie  in  France  did  not  amount  to  more  than  700,000,000. 
This  disproportion  hastened  on  the  catastrophe.  The  sys- 
tem held  together  only  by  public  confidence,  and  that  confi- 
dence could  not  long  be  maintained.  To  save  the  company, 
that  is  to  say,  the  venturous  part  of  the  system,  Law  united 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  4°5 

it  to  the  bank,  that  is  to  say,  to  the  serious  and  useful  part. 
It  was  the  ruin  of  both.  As  early  as  the  close  of  1719  the 
enthusiasm  of  a  few  became  cooled ;  the  more  prudent 
began  to  realize  and  presented  themselves  at  the  bank  for 
specie.  This  example  caused  alarm  and  became  contagious; 
the  realizers  multiplied;  they  sold  their  shares  at  the  highest 
current  rate,  and  with  their  bills  bought  gold,  silver,  dia- 
monds, lands.  The  shares  ceased  to  go  up,  fluctuated,  then 
rapidly  went  down.  Law,  become  controller  general, 
struggled  desperately  against  the  realizers:  specie  payments 
were  forbidden;  it  was  prohibited  to  have  at  one's  house 
gold  or  silver;  then  came  prosecutions,  domiciliary  visits, 
denunciations;  a  son  even  denounced  his  father.  But  con- 
fidence in  the  bills  went  on  diminishing.  Then  suddenly 
tacking,  the  state,,  which  had  lately  proscribed  hard  money, 
announced  that  it  would  receive  no  more  payments  in  paper; 
this  was  giving  the  death  blow  to  the  system. 

Law  escaped  from  France  pursued  by  public  curses  (De- 
cember, 1720).  He  had  come  into  the  country  with  1,600,- 
ooo  francs;  he  carried  away  only  a  few  louis.  It  remained 
to  liquidate  accounts.  The  brothers  Paris-Duverney  con- 
ducted the  operations,  by  which  the  state  acknowledged 
itself  debtor  to  the  creditors  of  the  company  to  the  amount 
of  1,700,000,000  francs.  The  public  debt  was  increased  by 
40,000,000  in  annuities.  But  the  extinction  of  a  large 
number  of  offices  and  the  redemption  of  many  branches  of 
alienated  revenues  compensated  for  this  increase.  The 
state  was  in  almost  the  same  financial  position  as  that  in 
which  Law  had  found  it. 

Such  is  the  history  of  this  famous  system.  It  showed  the 
power  of  credit;  it  gave  an  energetic  impulse  to  manu- 
factures and  maritime  commerce ;  it  delivered  the  country 
from  amass  of  onerous  immunities;  finally,  if  it  ruined  indi- 
viduals, it  ameliorated  the  general  condition  by  a  distribu- 
tion of  property  more  favorable  to  the  humbler  classes;  but 
also,  by  reversing  previous  conditions  and  fortunes,  it 
increased  the  disturbance  which  had  already  begun  in 
morals  and  ideas,  and  which  afterward  resulted  in  still  greater 
disorder.  This  epoch  has  attained  a  sad  celebrity  for  the 
depravity  of  its  morals. 

At  the  beginning  of  1723  Louis  XV.  was  declared  of  age 
and  the  regency  of  the  Duke  of  Orleans  terminated.  But 
the  king  was  to  remain  much  longer  under  guardianship; 


406  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

the  duke,  in  order  to  retain  the  power  after  laying  down 
the  regency,  had  formerly  given  Dubois  the  title  of  prime 
minister,  which  he  assumed  himself  after  the  death  of  that 
sorry  person,  but  which  he  kept  only  four  months.  He 
died  December  2,  1723.  France  had  been  eight  years  in  his 
hands;  this  period  had  sufficed  for  the  outburst  of  the  moral 
revolution  made  ready  during  the  last  days  of  Louis  XIV. 
To  avert  its  political  and  social  consequences  a  great  reign 
would  have  been  necessary;  but  the  prince  who  was  about 
to  rule  was  to  set  the  example  in  every  scandal,  to  develop 
every  abuse,  and  to  humble  France  before  the  foreigner. 

To  the  Duke  of  Orleans  succeeded  the  Duke  of  Bourbon, 
who  was  controlled  by  a  contemptible  woman,  the  March- 
ioness of  Prie.  Sold  to  England,  she  was  able  to  cause  a 
rupture  with  Spain  only  by  sending  back  the  infanta,  who 
had  been  brought  up  at  the  French  court  as  the  betrothed 
of  the  king,  and  by  making  Louis  XV.  marry  the  daughter 
of  Stanislaus  Leczinski  (1725).  She  had  reason  for  hoping 
that  the  new  queen,  Mary  Leczinska,  as  her  beneficiary, 
would  support  her  through  gratitude.  But  she  had  counted 
without  Fleury,  Bishop  of  Frejus.  He  was  the  tutor  of  the 
king,  and  perhaps  the  only  man  for  whom  Louis  XV.  had  a 
sincere  attachment.  During  the  regency  he  had  concealed 
his  ambition,  waiting  patiently  till  some  place  was  vacant 
that  he  might  slip  into  it  by  stealth.  The  government  of 
the  Duke  of  Bourbon  had  become  odious  by  his  persecu- 
tions of  the  Protestants  and  by  the  vexatious  imposts  that 
he  decreed.  The  last  of  the  four  brothers  Paris-Duverney, 
who  controlled  the  finances,  had  just  irritated  the  privileged 
classes  by  an  income  tax  of  two  per  cent.,  which  all  were 
obliged  to  pay.  Despite  the  opposition  of  the  nobility  and 
the  clergy,  Duverney  forced  its  registration  by  means  of  a 
bed  of  justice.*  The  public  hatred  against  the  Duke  of 
Bourbon  was  still  further  increased  by  a  famine  which  was 


*  A  solemn  and  extraordinary  session  of  Parliament,  wherein  the  king  sat 
in  a  pile  of  cushions  surrounded  by  princes  of  the  blood  and  high  nobles, 
was  called  a  bed  of  justice.  Such  sessions  were  held  for  the  compulsory 
registration  and  enactment  of  decrees,  which  Parliament  had  refused  to 
approve.  The  ceremonies  were  Oriental  rather  than  European  in  their 
pomp  and  in  the  accompanying  adulation  paid  the  sovereign.  Nothing 
created  greater  resentment  than  these  despotic  beds  of  justice,  and  noth- 
ing in  old  France  showed  more  clearly  that  the  government  was  that  of 
an  absolute,  irresponsible  monarchy. — ED. 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  4°7 

less  attributed  to  the  rainy  season  than  to  the  carelessness 
of  the  government.  The  duke  hastened  his  ruin  by  attack- 
ing the  Bishop  of  Frejus.  One  day  he  succeeded  in  separat- 
ing him  from  the  person  of  the  king  at  the  hour  of  the 
council,  but  in  the  evening  Louis  asked  for  his  tutor. 
Fleury,  who  had  retired  to  Issy,  returned;  the  Duke  of 
Bourbon  was  exiled  to  his  lands,  and  Paris-Duverney  sent 
to  the  Bastille  (1726). 

Fleury  assumed  power  at  the  age  of  seventy-three,  and 
kept  it  till  his  death  in  1743.  With  a  modest  exterior  and 
without  taking  any  other  title  than  that  of  minister  of  state, 
he  was  in  reality  as  absolute  as  Richelieu.  His  administra- 
tion, wise,  though  destitute  of  grandeur,  brought  the  country 
out  of  the  distress  into  which  it  had  been  plunged  during 
the  last  years  of  Louis  XIV.  by  so  many  disastrous  wars, 
and  during  the  regency  by  the  empiricism  of  Law.  Eco- 
nomical even  to  avarice,  Fleury  reintroduced  order  into  the 
finances.  He  reduced  and  suppressed  the  two  per  cent., 
reduced  the  taxes  by  10,000,000  francs,  raised  from  100,- 
600,000  to  140,000,000  the  annual  lease  of  farms  and  the 
general  receipts,  and  put  an  end  to  the  abuses  arising  from 
the  fluctuation  of  the  coin  by  giving  to  specie  an  equitable 
and  fixed  value.  The  skillful  financier  Orry,  whom  he 
made  controller  general,  employed  loans  with  prudence  and 
slightly  reanimated  public  credit,  which  had  been  utterly 
crushed  after  the  fall  of  Law.  Agriculture,  manufactures, 
and  commerce  received  encouragement.  But  what  the 
cardinal  owed  most  to  commerce,  and  what  he  did  not  give 
it,  was  a  powerful  navy.  Fleury,  like  the  regent,  sacrificed 
French  maritime  interests  to  the  English  alliance.  Pacific 
by  nature  and  system,  he  endeavored  in  concert  with  his 
good  friend  Horace  Walpole,  brother  of  the  celebrated  Eng- 
lish minister,  to  maintain  harmony  among  the  European 
powers. 

The  death  of  Augustus  II.,  King  of  Poland,  rendered  a 
conflict  inevitable.  The  immense  majority  of  the  Poles 
chose  Stanislaus  Leczinski;  the  Elector  of  Saxony  was 
nominated  under  the  protection  of  Russian  bayonets 
(1733).  The  King  of  France  could  not  without  shame 
refuse  to  support  his  father-in-law.  Fleury  was  carried 
along  by  the  popular  outcry.  But  instead  of  dispatching  a 
fleet  into  the  Baltic,  he  sent  thither  one  vessel  and  1500  men 
to  release  Stanislaus,  who  was  besieged  in  Dantzig;  the 


408  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

Count  of  Ple"lo,  French  ambassador  at  Copenhagen,  blushing 
for  his  country,  put  himself  at  the  head  of  the  detachment 
and  was  slain.  La  Peyrouse,  commander  of  the  troops, 
resisted  a  whole  month  with  a  handful  of  men.  Stanislaus 
escaped  from  a  thousand  dangers  and  returned  to  France 

(1734). 

Something  had  to  be  done  to  wipe  out  this  disgrace. 
Fleury  concluded  with  Savoy  a  treaty  which  promised  the 
Milanais  to  the  King  of  Sardinia,  and  to  the  Bourbons  of 
Spain  the  kingdom  of  Spain  for  the  infante  Don  Carlos. 
By  promising  he  would  not  attack  the  Netherlands  he 
obtained  the  neutrality  of  England  and  Holland.  Then  he 
sent  two  armies,  one  upon  the  Rhine,  which  captured  Kehl, 
and  one  into  Italy,  which  gained  the  victories  of  Parma 
(June)  and  Guastalla  (September).  The  Milanais  was  con- 
quered by  the  French,  and  Naples  by  the  Spaniards  at  the 
victory  of  Bitonto.  This  was  a  beautiful  awakening  for 
France;  but  the  timidity  of  the  cardinal  prevented  his 
reaping  all  the  fruits  of  these  successes. 

England  and  Holland  offered  their  mediation  to  Austria ; 
she  accused  them  almost  of  treason  in  not  having  followed 
her  upon  the  battlefield,  and  treated  directly  with  France. 
It  was  possible,  as  was  advised  by  Chauvelin,  keeper  of  the 
seals,  the  strongest  head  in  the  council,  to  exact  from  the 
emperor  an  entire  renunciation  to  Italy  just  as  France  for 
her  part  had  denied  herself  any  acquisition  there ;  he  was 
simply  made  to  renounce  all  claim  to  the  kingdom  of  the 
Two  Sicilies;  moreover,  he  was  thoughtfully  indemnified  by 
the  cession  of  Parma  and  Piacenza  for  himself  and  of  Tus- 
cany given  to  his  son-in-law  in  exchange  for  Lorraine.  The 
King  of  Sardinia  had  only  two  Milanese  provinces,  Novara 
and  Tortona.  By  a  supplementary  clause,  due  to  Chauve- 
lin, as  compensation  for  the  throne  of  Poland,  which  was 
left  to  Augustus,  Lorraine  and  Barrois  were  assigned  to 
Stanislaus,  and  after  his  death  to  revert  to  France.  This 
acquisition  was  precious,  though  long  since  inevitable. 
These  conditions  constituted  the  treaty  of  Vienna  (1735- 
38).  This  was  the  fairest  period  of  the  ministry  of 
Fleury;  France  in  this  war,  which  peculiarly  resembles  that 
of  1859,  had  acquired  a  little  glory,  and  her  government  had 
appeared  as  the  mediator  of  Europe.  "After  the  peace  of 
Vienna,"  said  the  great  Frederick,  "France  was  the  arbiter 
of  Europe."  Her  armies  had  triumphed  in  Italy  and  in  Ger- 


CHAP.  XXV.]          'CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  4°9 

many.  Her  minister  at  Constantinople,  the  Count  of 
Villeneuve,  had  concluded  the  peace  of  Belgrade,  the  last 
glorious  treaty  signed  by  Turkey,  whereby  she  regained 
Servia  with  Belgrade  and  a  part  of  Wallachia.  At  that 
moment  Austria  everywhere  recoiled,  in  Italy  as  well  as 
upon  the  Danube.  She  was  going  to  recoil  still  further 
during  the  two  Seven  Years'  wars,  and  at  the  same  time  to 
drag  France  with  her  toward  her  fall. 

In  1417  Frederick  of  Hohenzollern,  Burggrave  of  Nurem- 
berg, bought  of  the  Emperor  Sigismund  the  margravate  of 
r  Brandenburg,  to  which  was  attached  one  of 

Formation     of      ,  ,  ,       ,  ,  , 

Prussia  and  the  seven  electoral  votes ;  such  was  the  humble 
Austria1 '  ° "  °f  origm  of  that  monarchy  which  in  the  eigh- 
teenth century  counterbalanced  the  Austrian 
influence  in  Germany  and  succeeded  to  the  Swedish  influ- 
ence in  the  north,  and  in  the  nineteenth  has  become  a 
menace  to  all  the  powers  of  Europe. 

Frederick  II.,  the  Iron  Tooth  (1440),  acquired  a  part  of 
Lusatia  (Cottbus)  and  bought  the  New  Marches  (Custrin 
and  Landsberg  between  the  Oder  and  the  Netze)  from  the 
Teutonic  order.  His  brother  Albert,  "the  Ulysses  and  the 
Achilles  of  the  North"  (1469),  decreed  that  his  younger 
sons  should  have  Anspach  and  Bayreuth,  original  posses- 
sions of  the  family  in  Franconia,  but  that  the  other  domin- 
ions, present  and  prospective,  should  be  attached  to  the 
electorate,  which  was  to  form  an  indivisible  mass,  capable 
of  increase,  but  incapable  of  diminution.  This  measure  was 
a  guarantee  of  power  for  the  new  house.  Under  Joachim 
I.,surnamed  "Nestor"  (1499-1535),  Albert  of  Brandenburg, 
prince  of  the  younger  branch  and  grand  master  of  the 
Teutonic  order,  embraced  the  Reformation  (1525)  and 
secularized  ducal  Prussia  (Koenigsberg) ;  under  Joachim 
II.  (1535)  Lutheranism  was  introduced  into  the  electorate, 
to  which  John  Sigismund  (1608-19)  reunited  ducal  Prussia 
as  son-in-law  and  heir  of  the  last  duke.  This  same  prince 
asserted  his  right  to  the  succession  of  Juliers,  of  which 
George  William  (1619-40)  obtained  half,  that  is  to  say, 
the  duchy  of  Cleves  with  the  counties  of  Mark  near  the 
Rhine  and  of  Ravensberg  in  Westphalia. 

Thus  the  house  of  Hohenzollern  had  by  the  middle  of 
the  seventeenth  century  risen  above  the  other  princely 
houses  of  the  empire.  Its  dominions,  scattered  from  the 
Niemen  to  the  Meuse,  formed  three  distinct  groups.  To 


410  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTU'RY.         [BOOK  VI. 

unite  these  groups  in  one  was  of  prime  necessity,  for  their 
master  could  not  pass  from  one  to  the  other  without  asking 
the  permission  of  his  neighbors.  This  was  the  constant 
endeavor  of  Frederick  William,  who  is  called  the  Great 
Elector.  By  the  conventions  of  1648  he  gained  Magde- 
burg on  the  Elbe,  Halberstadt  and  Minden  on  the  Weser, 
Cammin  at  the  mouth  of  the  Oder  with  all  Farther  Pomer- 
ania  along  the  Baltic  from  the  Oder  toward  the  Gulf  of 
Dantzig.  He  had  a  considerable  army ;  he  employed  it  in 
a  war  between  Sweden  and  Poland,  seasonably  betrayed 
both  parties,  and  by  the  treaty  of  Weslau  (1657)  freed 
Prussia  from  Polish  supremacy  by  obtaining  the  cession  of 
Elbing  east  of  the  Vistula.  Within  his  dominions  the 
elector  had  emancipated  himself  from  the  control  of  the 
Provincial  States,  which  were  replaced  by  a  simple  consulta- 
tive committee ;  following  the  example  of  Louis  XIV.  in 
France,  he  rendered  his  power  absolute.  His  states  were 
scantily  peopled  and  poor;  he  attracted  to  them  colonists 
from  Holland  and  Friesland,  had  canals  dug,  founded  a 
factory  in  Guinea,  and  dreamed  of  a  company  for  African 
commerce.  Ally  of  the  house  of  Orange,  and  established 
on  the  Rhine  by  the  possession  of  the  duchy  of  Cleves,  he 
played  an  active  part  in  all  the  affairs  which  took  place  in 
that  direction.  Although  a  member  of  the  League  of  the 
Rhine,  he  denounced  to  Germany  the  ambition  of  Louis 
XIV.,  defended  Holland  against  him  in  1672,  and  at  the 
battle  of  Fehrbellin,  which  he  gained  over  the  Swedes,  allies 
of  France,  founded  the  reputation  of  Prussian  arms.  He 
already  inspired  anxiety  in  Austria,  who  saw  with  regret  a 
new  King  of  the  Vandals  rise  on  the  banks  of  the  Oder;  so 
she  sacrificed  him  in  1678  at  the  treaty  of  Nimeguen,  and 
he  was  obliged  to  restore  his  conquests.  He  profitably 
employed  the  peace:  he  welcomed  many  French  Reformers, 
who  peopled  Berlin;  he  enlarged  that  capital,  which  in  1650 
had  only  6500  inhabitants;  and  he  founded  the  library  and 
chateau  of  Potsdam. 

Frederick  III.  continued  the  work  of  his  father  (1688). 
He  maintained  the  integrity  of  the  electorate  against  his 
brothers;  then,  excited  by  the  example  of  his  kinsman, 
William  of  Orange,  who  had  become  King  of  England,  and 
by  that  of  his  neighbor,  the  Elector  of  Saxony,  who  was 
called  to  the  throne  of  Poland,  and  of  the  Prince  of  Pied- 
mont, who  also  wished  to  become  a  king,  he  gave  6,000,000 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  411 

francs  to  the  emperor  so  that  Austria  might  permit  him  to 
assume  the  title  of  King  of  Prussia.  In  1701  he  crowned 
himself  with  his  own  hands  at  Koenigsburg.  So  a  sovereign 
duchy,  a  little  country  foreign  to  Germany,  became  a  king- 
dom, although  the  electorate  of  Brandenburg  and  his  other 
German  dominions  continued  to  depend  upon  the  empire. 
This  title,  accorded  a  poor  and  distant  province,  had  seemed 
of  no  consequence  to  the  Austrian  ministers,  who  were 
embarrassed  with  a  war  against  the  Ottomans  and  about  to 
enter  upon  that  of  the  Spanish  succession.  Eugene  alone 
comprehended  that  this  new  absolute  royalty  would  seek 
to  unite  its  sundered  provinces  and  would  become  an 
obstacle  to  the  power  of  Austria.  Prussia  in  fact  continued 
her  aggrandizements  upon  the  Rhine.  In  1702  William  III. 
of  Nassau-Orange,  King  of  England,  having  died  childless, 
Frederick  presented  himself  as  heir  of  his  patrimonial 
estates  and  took  possession  of  the  counties  of  Lingen  and 
Moers  in  Guelderland  and  of  Tecklenburg  north  of  Mun- 
ster.  Some  time  after  he  caused  himself  to  be  chosen  by 
the  States  of  Switzerland  Prince  of  Neufchatel.  Vain  and 
ostentatious,  Frederick  wished  to  copy  the  court  of  Louis 
XIV.:  much  money  was  thus  squandered,  but  letters  and 
arts  received  their  share;  he  founded  the  University  of 
Halle,  which  became  one  of  the  most  famous  in  Germany, 
and  the  Academy  of  Berlin,  over  which  Leibnitz  presided. 
Even  the  splendor  of  his  court  conferred  a  useful  prestige 
on  this  rising  monarchy. 

Frederick  III.,  who  as  king  was  called  Frederick  I.,  died 
in  1713;  at  the  treaty  of  Utrecht,  signed  six  months  later, 
the  King  of  Prussia  was  recognized  by  all  Europe  except  the 
Pope  and  the  Teutonic  knights ;  he  was  confirmed  sover- 
eign of  Neufchatel  and  Valengin;  in  place  of  the  French 
principality  of  Orange  he  received  Guelderland.  The  new 
kingdom  formed  already  a  mass  which  was  imposing,  but 
which  was  still  divided. 

Those  elements  of  strength  were  regulated  and  increased 
by  Frederick  William  I.  The  sergeant  king,  as  George  II. 
called  him,  was  the  enemy  of  ostentation.  Instead  of 
encouraging  learned  men  he  confiscated  the  funds  of  the 
library  for  the  benefit  of  the  army,  had  neither  court  nor 
ministers,  and  made  of  Berlin  a  manufactory  and  a  barrack. 
He  sought  after  men  six  feet  tall  to  make  them  soldiers,  paid 
for  them  as  much  as  2000  crowns  apiece,  and  managed  the 


4J2  THE   EIGHTEENTH  CEXTl'RY.         [BOOK  VI. 

state  like  a  regiment.  His  heroes  were  Peter  the  Great, 
Charles  XII.,  and  the  old  Prince  of  Anhalt-Dessau,  who 
had  created  the  Prussian  infantry  and  had  commanded  it 
forty  years.  He  made  of  his  subjects  submissive  soldiers, 
bigoted  Calvinists,  tireless  workers ;  he  himself  was  accus- 
tomed to  beat  lazy  people  in  the  street.  "Under  our 
father,"  said  Frederick  II.,  "nobody  in  the  Prussian  states 
had  more  than  three  ells  of  cloth  in  his  clothes  and  less  than 
two  ells  of  sword  at  his  side."  With  such  ideas  how  could 
he  approve  of  his  son,  who  learned  to  play  the  flute  and  read 
French  authors?  Thus  the  royal  prince  passed  a  dreary 
youth.  He  wished  to  become  his  own  master  and  formed 
a  plot  to  escape,  but  he  saw  his  friend  Kat  executed,  was 
himself  condemned  to  death,  and  remained  some  time  in 
prison. 

From  the  commencement  of  his  reign  Frederick  William 
had  an  army  of  60,000  men.  Charles  XII.  on  his  return 
from  Turkey  solicited  his  alliance,  but  as  he  attacked  the 
island  of  Usedom,  which  was  held  by  a  Prussian  garrison, 
the  King  of  Prussia  joined  a  league  formed  against  the 
Swedes,  contributed  to  the  capture  of  Stralsund  in  1715, 
and  at  the  peace  of  Stockholm  in  1720  acquired  for 
6,000,000  francs  Stettin  and  almost  all  Hither  Pomerania. 
He  had  made  an  advantageous  trial  of  his  strength;  never- 
theless, through  love  of  the  common  country,  he  always 
respected  the  house  of  Austria  and  remained  its  ally  against 
England,  and  especially  against  France,  whose  influence  in 
the  empire  he  wished  to  destroy. 

Another  thought  preoccupied  him:  Poland  by  its  prolon- 
gation to  the  Baltic,  and  its  occupation  of  royal  Prussia  on 
both  banks  of  the  lower  Vistula,  separated  ducal  Prussia 
from  the  electorate  of  Brandenburg.  As  early  as  1656  the 
Great  Elector  had  thought  much  about  that  tongue  of  land: 
this  was  the  first  idea  of  the  partition  of  Poland.  Should 
the  Elector  of  Saxony  establish  himself  firmly  in  that  coun- 
try and  make  of  it  a  hereditary  kingdom  it  would  be  dan- 
gerous for  Prussia;  she  proposed  its  division  to  Augustus 
II.,  who  was  King  of  Poland  till  1733:  this  was  the  revived 
idea  of  dismemberment.  It  was  furthermore  necessary  that 
French  influence  should  not  prevail  there  with  Stanislaus 
Leczinski;  Frederick  William  allied  himself  in  1733  with 
Russia  and  Austria  to  exclude  the  candidate  of  France;  he 
hoped  to  impose  his  conditions  on  the  candidate  of  Austria 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  4M 

and  Russia,  or  at  least  to  again  resume  the  idea  of  division. 
But  this  design  was  disappointed  by  the  election  of  Augus- 
tus III.  In  the  war  which  ensued  Frederick  William  took 
part  against  France,  and  sent  his  son  to  the  Rhine  with 
10,000  men.  There  the  young  Frederick  saw  at  the  head 
of  an  army  the  veteran  Eugene  of  Savoy,  who  was  then 
nothing  more  than  the  shadow  of  himself;  he  also  divined 
the  weakness  of  Austria.  Prussia,  on  the  contrary,  was  the 
best  organized  state  of  Europe.  The  army  was  on  an 
excellent  footing,  the  treasury  well  filled,  agriculture  and 
manufactures  flourishing;  the  population  was  increasing  by 
natural  development  and  by  the  newcomers  whom  the  king 
attracted  under  the  pretense  of  protecting  the  Reformers, 
whom  he  wished  to  unite  in  one  great  religious  body. 
Nobody  dared  support  the  Protestants  of  Salzburg,  who 
made  complaints  to  the  diet  against  their  archbishop. 
Frederick  William  offered  them  an  asylum,  which  18,000 
of  them  accepted.  So  Prussia  assumed  the  role  which 
Sweden  had  acted  under  Gustavus  Adolphus. 

In  1740  Frederick  II.,  who  well  deserved  the  title  of  the 
Great,  ascended  the  throne.  He  continued  his  relations 
with  the  principal  writers  of  France,  but  without  Showing 
himself  disposed  to  follow  their  maxims.  It  was  evident 
that  in  his  retreat  at  Rheinsberg  he  had  also  studied  the  art 
of  government.  Under  the  Great  Elector  Prussia  had  risen 
to  the  first  rank  among  the  states  of  Germany ;  under 
Frederick  II.  she  took  her  place  among  the  leading 
European  powers. 

In  the  presence  of  this  expanding  state  Austria  declined. 
The  treaty  of  Westphalia  had  deprived  her  of  Alsace;  in 
1699,  after  the  victory  of  Zenta  over  the  Ottomans,  she  had 
at  the  treaty  of  Carlovitch  offset  this  loss  by  the  acquisition 
of  Transylvania  and  Sclavonia;  at  the  treaty  of  Rastadt  her 
part  in  the  heritage  of  Charles  II.  of  Spain  had  been  the 
Netherlands,  the  Milanais,  Naples,  and  the  island  of  Sar- 
dinia. This  last  possession  was  soon  exchanged  for  Sicily. 
Leopold  I.  (1658-1705)  had  contended  against  Louis  XIV., 
so  did  Joseph  I.  (1705-11),  and  finally  his  brother,  Charles 
VI.,  whom  Berwick  and  Vendome  had  driven  from  Spain. 
The  new  emperor,  under  whom  was  signed  the  peace  of 
Rastadt,  had  two  wars  to  carry  on  against  the  Ottomans. 
In  the  first,  thanks  to  Eugene,  he  was  a  conqueror  (victo- 
ries of  Peterwardein,  1716,  and  of  Belgrade,  1717;  treaty  of 


414  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

Passarovitch,  1718),  and  Austria  gained  the  banat  of  Temes- 
var,  Belgrade,  and  the  northwest  of  Servia.  In  the  second 
the  Ottomans  retook  what  they  had  just  ceded  except  the 
banat  (treaty  of  Belgrade,  1739).  We  have  already  seen 
the  struggle  excited  by  Alberoni  and  the  war  for  the  suc- 
cession in  Poland,  which  cost  Austria  the  kingdom  of  the 
Two  Sicilies,  and  gave  her  Parma  and  Piacenza  in  compen- 
sation, whereby  her  position  in  the  north  of  the  peninsula 
was  made  stronger. 

The  main  concern  of  Charles  VI.  was  the  settlement  of 
the  succession.  He  had  no  son  ;  with  him  was  to  become 
extinct  the  male  line  of  the  Hapsburgs,  which  had  given 
fifteen  emperors  to  Germany.  For  the  purpose  of  assuring 
the  heritage  to  his  daughter,  Maria  Theresa,  he  had  shrunk 
from  no  sacrifice.  He  had  suppressed  the  Ostend  Com- 
pany in  order  to  please  the  maritime  powers ;  had  ceded 
Lorraine  to.  gain  France,  Naples  and  Sicily  to  gain  Spain. 
He  had  obtained  from  all  the  states  a  solemn  recognition  of 
his  pragmatic,*  and  when  he  died  in  1740,  the  same  year 
that  Frederick  II.  ascended  the  Prussian  throne,  he  left 
Maria  Theresa  an  ample  collection  of  parchments.  Said 
Frederick  II. :  "An  army  of  200,000  men  would  have  been 
worth  more."  Hardly  had  he  expired  when  five  pretenders 
appeared.!  These  were  the  Elector  of  Bavaria,  who 
descended  from  a  daughter  of  Ferdinand  I.,  the  King  of 
Spain,  who  descended  from  Charles  V.  on  the  female  side, 
and  the  Elector  of  Saxony,  son-in-law  of  the  emperor 
Joseph  I. :  each  of  these  three  demanded  the  entire  inherit- 


*  A  pragmatic  sanction  or  pragmatic  is  the  technical  name  given  to 
certain  decrees  which  were  issued  as  fundamental  laws.  That  of  the 
Austrian  Charles  VI.  was  announced  in  1713  to  the  Secret  Council  in 
Vienna  and  contained  three  articles ;  (i)  That  the  Austrian  states  con- 
stitute an  indivisible  whole  ;  (2)  that  the  male  heirs  of  the  Austrian  house 
succeed  according  to  seniority  ;  (3)  that  in  default  of  male  heir,  daughters 
are  to  succeed  in  the  following  order  :  first,  those  of  Charles  VI.;  second, 
those  of  Joseph  ;  third,  those  of  Leopold  I.  This  pragmatic,  succes- 
sively accepted  by  the  different  states  and  diets  of  the  Austrian  mon- 
archy, was  proclaimed  as  a  fundamental  law  December  6,  1724.  It  was 
furthermore  recognized  by  the  European  states  in  the  following  order:  by 
Prussia  and  Russia  in  1726;  England  and  Holland,  1731  ;  Germany, 
1732  ;  Poland,  1733  ;  France,  Spain,  and  Sardinia,  1735. — ED. 

f  History  affords  few  more  striking  examples  of  the  fact  that  very  often 
the  most  solemn  agreements  are  valueless  when  there  is  not  sufficient 
power  to  enforce  their  provisions. — ED. 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  4^5 

ance  by  right  of  blood  ;  also  the  King  of  Sardinia  laid  claim 
to  the  duchy  of  Milan,  and  the  King  of  Prussia  to  four 
duchies  of  Silesia,  basing  his  demands  upon  ancient  treaties 
of  succession,  which  his  predecessors  had  neglected  to 
enforce. 

Frederick  II.  had  not  a  large  kingdom,  but  his  father  had 

left  him  a  full  treasury  and  a  splendid   army,  and  Nature 

had    endowed    him    with    the    rarest    talents. 

War     of     the  ,  .  111  i    • 

Austrian  succes-  He  forgot  the  doctrines  he  had  extolled  m 
his  "Anti-Machiavelli"  and  yielded  to  the 
temptation  of  putting  his  hand  upon  Silesia,  a  rich  province 
whose  acquisition  would  double  the  population  of  his  states. 
Without  communicating  his  project  to  anyone  he  invaded 
it  with  40,000  men,  conquered  it  in  a  few  weeks,  then 
offered  a  sincere  peace  and  his  alliance  as  the  price  of 
its  formal  cession.  Maria  Theresa,  a  woman  of  energy  and 
talent,  acted  like  a  king.  She  was  unwilling  to  inaugurate 
her  reign  by  a  dismemberment  without  having  at  least  sent 
the  veterans  of  Eugene  against  this  parvenu  royalty  and 
against  its  troops,  who  as  yet  had  only  fought  on  parade. 
The  attempt  was  not  successful;  the  Prussians  gained  the 
victory  of  Molvitz  (1741). 

At  the  beginning  of  this  campaign  Frederick  had  said  to 
the  French  ambassador:  "I  am  going  to  play  your  game; 
if  the  aces  fall  to  me  we  will  share."  The  Count  of  Belle 
Isle,  grandson  of  Fouquet,  a  bold  and  adventurous  schemer, 
proposed  in  the  council  alliance  with  Prussia  and  a  plan 
which  would  reduce  Maria  Theresa  to  Hungary,  lower  Aus- 
tria, and  Belgium,  and  would  divide  the  rest  among  the 
pretenders.  The  Elector  of  Bavaria  was  to  be  emperor; 
France  asked  nothing  for  herself.  This  was  generosity  on 
too  large  a  scale,  but  grand  sentiments*  in  foreign  policy 
were  exceedingly  esteemed  at  the  court  of  Louis  XV.  To 
play  the  magnanimous  was  his  desire  in  order  to  be  obliged 
to  act  as  little  as  possible.  Despite  Fleury  this  plan  was 
adopted  and  the  treaty  of  Nymphenburg  concluded  on  these 
bases  (May  18,  1741). 


*  It  is  difficult  to  discern  the  "  grand  sentiments"  of  a  scheme  which 
was  a  violation  of  French  oaths,  and  which,  without  even  pretext  of 
advantage  to  France,  was  to  rob  Maria  Theresa  of  her  legitimate  posses- 
sions. That  this  scheme  can  be  called  "grand"  shows  how  low  was 
the  general  sentiment  under  the  reign  of  Louis  XV. — ED. 


4i6  THE   EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

France,  instead  of  acting  resolutely  with  all  her  forces  as 
one  ought  when  he  draws  the  sword,  put  in  movement  only 
40,000  men;  instead  of  striking  a  blow  toward  the  Nether- 
lands, where  her  destinies  were  calling,  she  sent  her  army 
to  the  extremity  of  Bavaria,  repeating  in  Germany  the  errors 
so  many  times  committed  in  Italy.  It  is  just  to  say  that  the 
maritime  powers  had  placed  the  same  condition  upon  their 
neutrality  as  during  the  preceding  war,  to  wit,  that  France 
should  not  dispatch  a  soldier  into  Belgium.  Master  of 
Linz,  the  chief  bulwark  of  Austria  on  the  tipper  Danube, 
the  elector  could  have  taken  Vienna:  he  preferred  to  con- 
quer Bohemia.  Maria  Theresa,  who  a  few  days  before  had 
written,  "Soon  there  will  not  be  left  me  a  single  city  for  my 
lying-in,"  had  time  to  rouse  her  faithful  Hungarians.  She 
presented  herself  in  the  midst  of  the  Diet  carrying  her  child 
in  her  arms.  The  magnates  were  touched  by  the  spectacle 
and  by  the  tears  of  the  young  sovereign ;  in  their  chivalrous 
tenderness  they  drew  their  sabers,  shouting:  "Moriamur  pro 
rege  nostro  Maria  Theresa!"  A  few  weeks  after  swarms 
of  Hungarians,  Croats,  Pandours,  and  Talpaches  inundated 
Bavaria;  the  convoys  were  seized,  the  communications 
intercepted,  and  while  the  Elector  of  Bavaria  was  being 
crowned  emperor  at  Frankfort  under  the  name  of  Charles 
VII.,  the  Austrians  entered  Munich  (January,  1742). 
Frederick  indeed  menaced  Moravia  and  beat  the  Austrians 
at  Czaslau  in  Bohemia  (May  17) ;  but  Maria  Theresa  under- 
stood the  right  moment  for  a  sacrifice:  she  abandoned  to 
him  Silesia,  and  in  return  Frederick  forgot  the  promise  he 
had  given  France  (July). 

This  defection  brought  on  others.  The  Elector  of 
Saxony  withdrew  from  the  war;  the  King  of  Sardinia  en- 
tered it,  but  on  the  side  of  Austria;  England,  which  had  just 
overthrown  the  ministry  of  the  pacific  Walpole  (February, 
1742),  and  had  declared  war  against  Spain  because  her 
colonies  were  closed  to  English  trade,  furiously  demanded 
war  against  France,  whose  commerce  the  English  thought 
was  being  too  rapidly  developed.  Besides,  she  was  unwill- 
ing that  the  ruin  of  "Austria,  her  European  police,"  should 
be  consummated.  The  new  minister  promised  Maria 
Theresa  a  subsidy  of  12,000,000  francs.  So  all  the  weight 
of  the  war  fell  back  upon  France,  which  had  taken  arms  only 
for  the  benefit  of  others.  When  the  Austrians  had  retaken 
Linz  aud  Budweis  the  French  army  of  Bohemia  was  cut  off 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  4*7 

from  Bavaria;  besieged  in  Prague,  it  at  least  defended  itself 
well.  Fleury,  who  lately  was  disarming,  thinking  the  war 
finished,  was  troubled  by  these  reverses,  and  wrote  a  confi- 
dential and  most  humble  letter  to  the  Count  of  Konigsegg, 
the  Austrian  general.  This  Konigsegg  published.  The 
old  man  complained  in  a  second  letter,  and  declared  to  the 
count  that  he  would  no  more  write  him  what  he  thought. 
This  letter  also  was  made  public.  Fleury,  twice  tricked 
in  the  sight  of  Europe,  put  the  crown  upon  his  discomfiture 
by  disavowing  his  own  letters.  He  spoiled  everything  by 
his  timidity.  Maillebois,  who  was  maneuvering  in  Fran- 
conia,  could  do  nothing  more  for  the  deliverance  of  Prague 
than  make  himself  master  of  Eger.  At  least  thus  was  opened 
a  line  of  retreat  to  Belle  Isle  whereby  to  re-enter  the  valley 
of  the  Main.  Belle  Isle  in  fact  with  14,000  men  evacuated 
Prague,  and  made  through  the  ice,  the  snow,  and  the  enemy 
a  glorious  but  painful  retreat.  The  noble  and  unfortunate 
Vauvenargues  there  ruined  his  health.  Chevert  remained 
in  the  city  with  the  wounded  and  the  sick.  He  was  sum- 
moned to  surrender  at  discretion.  "Say  to  your  general 
that  if  he  does  not  grant  me  the  honors  of  war  I  will  set 
fire  to  the  four  corners  of  Prague  and  will  bury  myself 
under  its  ruins."  The  conditions  he  exacted  were  accorded 
(January,  1743).  A  few  days  after  Fleury  died  at  the  age 
of  ninety:  he  had  wished  peace  at  any  price,  and  he  left 
France  with  a  great  war  on  its  hands. 

England  had  entered  into  the  conflict;  50,000  English 
and  Germans  arrived  in  the  valley  of  the  Main;  Marshal 
Noailles  shut  them  up  at  Dettingen,  but  the  mad  impetu- 
osity of  the  Duke  of  Gramont  compromised  his  able  com- 
binations, and  it  was  only  a  bloody  affair  instead  of  a  victory. 
De  Broglie,  who  commanded  on  the  Danube,  drew  back 
as  far  as  the  Rhine  before  the  Austrians,  and  Noailles  was 
compelled  to  follow  this  movement  of  retreat.  To  improve 
affairs  it  was  deemed  necessary  to  put  the  king  at  the  head 
of  the  armies.  A  new  favorite,  the  Duchess  of  Chateau- 
roux,  an  energetic  and  ambitious  woman,  wished  to  rouse 
him  from  his  shameful  lethargy.  Therefore  Louis  XV. 
came  in  1744  to  show  himself  to  his  troops.  The  general 
plan  of  the  war  had  been  changed.  Instead  of  fighting  in 
the  recesses  of  Germany  it  was  decided  to  strike  blows 
nearer  France.  The  king  entered  the  Netherlands  and  saw 
Marshal  Saxe  capture  many  cities.  On  the  news  that  the 


4*8  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

Austrians  were  menacing  Alsace  he  hastened  thither,  taking 
with  him  Noailles  and  50,000  men. 

A  severe  sickness  arrested  him  at  Metz.  Approaching 
death  inspired  him  with  a  noble  resolution,  which  unhappily 
did  not  long  continue,  and  with  a  noble  remark.  He  sent 
away  the  Duchess  of  Chateauroux  in  order  to  reconcile 
himself  with  the  queen,  and  wrote  to  Marshal  Noailles: 
"Remember  that  while  men  were  carrying  Louis  XIII.  to 
the  tomb  the  Prince  of  Conde  gained  a  battle."  France 
paid  with  her  gratitude  for  this  effort  of  her  king.  "If  he 
dies,"  they  said,  "it  is  because  he  marched  to  our  assist- 
ance. He  dies  at  the  moment  when  he  was  going  to 
become  a  great  king!"  One  evening  the  rumor  reached 
Paris  that  he  was  no  more:  at  once  an  afflicted  crowd 
thronged  the  streets  and  the  churches  with  tears  and 
groans.  After  they  learned  that  he  still  lived  there  was 
every  day  a  crowd  of  people  waiting  for  the  couriers;  and 
those  who  brought  good  news  were  carried  on  men's  shoul- 
ders in  triumph.  When  finally  they  learned  of  his  conval- 
escence the  churches  resounded  with  thanksgivings,  praises 
to  God  for  having  preserved  the  "Well  Beloved."  How 
easy  was  its  task  to  this  royalty  still  so  popular! 

However,  the  King  of  Prussia,  alarmed  by  the  progress  of 
the  Austrians,  resumed  arms  and  marched  into  Bohemia. 
This  diversion  liberated  the  line  of  the  Rhine.  The  elector 
returned  to  his  electorate,  but  only  to  die.  His  son  treated 
with  Maria  Theresa.  The  Queen  of  Hungary  restored 
him  what  she  still  occupied  in  Bavaria,  and  Maximilian 
renounced  all  claim  to  the  Austrian  succession  (treaty  of 
Fuessen,  1745). 

France  had  no  longer  any  object  in  pursuing  the  war;  but 
as  the  enemy  refused  to  treat,  she  was  obliged  to  conquer  a 
peace.  France  sought  it  in  the  Netherlands.  Marshal 
Saxe,  dying  as  he  was,  put  himself  at  the  head  of  the  troops 
and  invested  Tournai.  To  prevent  its  capture  55,000 
English  and  Dutch  approached  the  city  under  the  command 
of  the  Duke  of  Cumberland.  The  marshal  gained  over 
them  the  battle  of  Fontenoy.  This  victory  had  important 
results.  Tournai,  Ghent,  the  depot  general  of  the  enemy, 
Oudenarde,  Bruges,  Dendermonde,  and  Ostend  capitulated. 
At  the  beginning  of  the  following  year  the  French  entered 
Brussels. 

The  King  of  Prussia,  meanwhile,  victorious  at  Friedberg 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  4*9 

in  Silesia,  wrote  to  Louis  XV.:  "I  have  just  honored  the 
bill  of  exchange  which  your  Majesty  drew  upon  me  at  Fon- 
tenoy."  The  victory  of  Kesseldorf  afterward  opened  to 
him  Saxony  and  Dresden;  he  there  signed  with  Maria 
Theresa  a  new  treaty  which  confirmed  to  him  the  cession  of 
Silesia.  This  defection  did  not  leave  France  a  single  ally 
in  Germany ;  the  defeat  of  the  pretender  Charles  Stuart, 
who,  after  having  marched  to  within  thirty  leagues  of  Lon- 
don, was  conquered  at  Culloden  (1746),  prevented  a  revo- 
lution which  would  long  have  paralyzed  England.  Maria 
Theresa  and  George  II.,  free  from  all  disquietude,  the  one 
as  to  Prussia,  the  other  as  to  the  Jacobites,  imparted  a  new 
activity  to  the  hostilities.  Maria  Theresa  endeavored  to 
indemnify  herself  in  Italy  for  what  she  had  lost  in  Germany 
and  for  what  she  might  still  lose  in  the  Netherlands.  The 
Franco-Spanish  army,  after  an  ineffectual  attempt  upon 
Savoy,  had  secured  the  territory  of  Nice  by  the  victory  of 
Coni  (1744),  and  the  Piedmontese  Apennines  by  alliance 
with  the  Duke  of  Modena  and  the  Genoese.  The  battle  of 
Bassigliano  won  for  it  the  Milanais  (1745).  But  the  empress 
sent  superior  forces  into  Italy.  Lichtenstein  collected 
there  45,000  Austrians  to  whom  Maillebois  could  oppose 
only  26,000  men.  The  day  of  Piacenza  and  the  defection 
of  Spain  gave  the  Imperialists  all  the  north  of  the  peninsula. 
For  her  part,  England,  who  in  1745  had  bombarded  all  the 
coast  of  Liguria  and  Genoa  itself,  endeavored  in  1746  to 
seize  Lorient,  and  seconded  an  invasion  of  Austro-Sardinians 
in  Provence.  The  allies  penetrated  the  country  till  within 
sight  of  Toulon.  But  this  invasion  had  the  fate  of  all  the 
others.  The  energetic  measures  of  Marshal  de  Belle  Isle 
and  the  insurrection  of  Genoa  against  the  Austrians  deter- 
mined a  retreat. 

In  the  south,  therefore,  France  only  succeeded  in  defend- 
ing her  frontier;  and  the  fine  plan,  formed  by  the  minister 
d'Argenson,  for  driving  the  foreigners  from  Italy  and  uniting 
all  the  states  of  the  peninsula  in  an  Italian  confederation, 
had  miscarried  to  the  great  disadvantage  of  Italy  itself  and 
of  the  peace  of  the  world.  But  at  the  north  France  won 
magnificent  successes.  The  battle  of  Rancoux,  gained  by 
Marshal  Saxe,  signalized  the  year  1746.  After  each  victory 
Louis  asked  nothing  but  peace,  '*not  wishing,  however," 
he  said,  "to  treat  as  a  merchant,  but  as  a  king. "  Thisunac- 
customed  disinterestedness  was  not  credited,  and  Holland, 


420  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

terrified  at  seeing  the  French  at  its  gates,  re-established 
the  stadtholderate,  as  in  1672  sacrificing  its  liberty  to  save 
its  independence.  Persuaded  by  England,  which  sought 
everywhere  enemies  for  France,  the  Czarina  Elizabeth  also 
concluded  a  subsidized  treaty,  and  put  at  the  disposition  of 
the  enemies  of  France  50  Russian  ships  and  37,000  men,  who 
marched  toward  the  Rhine.  France,  alone  against  all,  still 
advanced  in  the  Netherlands,  peace  in  one  hand  and  a 
sword  in  the  other.  Marshal  Saxe  gained  the  battle  of  Law- 
feld  (1747)  and  the  Count  of  Lowendal  took  the  "impreg- 
nable" Berg-op-Zoom.  Holland  was  invaded.  Marshal 
Saxe  by  skillful  maneuvers  in  1748  completed  the  invest- 
ment of  Maestricht. 

War  was  not  declared  by  France  against  England  until 
1744,  after  the  brilliant  naval  battle  of  Toulon,  which  was 
indecisive,  like  so  many  other  actions  at  sea.  But  that 
splendid  beginning  was  not  kept  up.  Brest  and  Toulon 
were  blockaded  by  the  English,  Antibes  bombarded,  and 
Lorient  escaped  them  only  by  a  panic  which  made  them 
run  toward  their  ships  instead  of  entering  the  badly  defended 
city.  The  French  with  35  ships  of  the  line  could  not  con- 
tend against  no.  In  their  defeats  the  commanders  of  their 
squadrons  at  least  deserved  honor  for  their  heroic  courage. 
Off  Cape  Finisterre  the  Marquis  de  la  Jonquiere,  in  order 
to  save  a  convoy  en  route  to  Canada,  with  6  ships  made 
head  against  17  (May  3,  1747).  He  was  captured  after 
the  most  glorious  resistance.  "I  have  never  seen  equal 
courage,"  wrote  one  of  his  conquerors.  The  French 
had  7  ships  on  the  Atlantic:  with  them  M.  de  1'Estanduere 
was  to  convoy  a  merchant  fleet  of  250  sail.  Near  Belle 
Isle  he  met  Admiral  Hawke  with  15  ships,  and  to  save 
his  convoy  gave  battle.  It  was  desperate.  Two  ships,  the 
Tonnant  and  the  Intrfyide,  passed  through  the  entire 
victorious  fleet  and  returned  to  Brest,  floating  heaps  of 
bloody  ruins.  The  English  admiral  was  obliged  to  under- 
go a  court-martial  for  having  allowed  them  to  escape. 
"In  this  war,"  said  an  English  historian,  "England  owed 
her  victories  only  to  the  number  of  her  ships."  In 
America  the  English  took  from  the  French  Louisburg  and 
the  important  island  of  Cape  Breton,  which  might  have 
been  a  substitute  for  Acadia,  lost  in  1713.  In  the  Indies 
France  had  two  men,  La  Bourdonnais  and  Dupleix,  who  if 
they  had  been  able  to  agree,  and  if  they  had  been  supported, 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  421 

could  have  acquired  Hindustan  for  their  country.  The 
former  had  created  everything  at  Bourbon  and  the  Isle  of 
France,  of  which  he  was  governor  for  the  India  Company: 
farms,  arsenals,  fortifications,  all  were  due  to  him.  An 
engineer,  soldier,  and  mariner,  nothing  arrested  him.  From 
the  Isle  of  France,  which  with  its  excellent  harbor  was  the 
key  of  the  Indian  Ocean,  he  scoured  that  sea  and  drove 
from  it  the  English.  Dupleix,  another  man  of  genius,  pro- 
posed to  expel  them  from  the  continent-like  peninsula  of 
Hindustan.  He  dreamed  of  splendid  enterprises.  He 
desired  that  the  company  whose  factories  in  Hindustan  he 
superintended  should  not  only  increase  its  commerce  but  its 
territory.  For  success  these  two  men  should  have  acted  in 
concert.  At  the  capture  of  Madras  they  had  a  mortal  quar- 
rel, and  La  Bourdonnais,  recalled  to  France,  was  on  his 
return  confined  in  the  Bastille  upon  accusations  received 
from  India.  Dupleix  atoned  for  this  foul  deed  by  the  mag- 
nificent defense  which  in  1748  he  made  of  Pondicherry ;  he 
saved  the  city  and  inflicted  upon  the  English  a  check  which 
echoed  even  to  Europe.  Peace  was  therefore  as  inoppor- 
tune for  France  in  India  as  it  was  in  the  Netherlands ;  but 
the  French  navy  was  reduced  to  two  ships,  the  debt  had  in- 
creased 1,200,000,000  francs,  and  the  king,  incapable  of  any 
further  self-control,  asked  only  to  be  left  to  his  pleasures. 
England,  which  dreaded  seeing  France  established  perma- 
nently at  the  mouth  of  the  Scheldt,  finally  decided  to  treat. 
The  peace  of  Aix-la-Chapelle  (April,  1748)  stipulated 
that  conquests  should  be  mutually  restored.  England 
regained  for  four  years  the  asicnto,  or  right  of  importing 
negroes  into  the  Spanish  colonies,  and  right  of  search  off 
those  coasts.  Austria  ceded  Parma  and  Piacenza  to  the 
infante  Don  Philip,  Silesia  to  the  King  of  Prussia,  and 
many  towns  of  the  Milanais  to  the  King  of  Sardinia. 
France  restored  Madras  and  re-entered  into  possession  of 
Cape  Breton;  but  she  retained  nothing  in  the  Netherlands, 
almost  all  of  which  she  held,  and  she  submitted  to  the 
condition  of  fortifying  Dunkirk  only  on  the  landward  side. 
English  commissioners,  whose  salary  France  was  to  pay, 
watched  over  the  execution  of  this  condition.  When  King 
George  exacted  the  expulsion  of  the  Pretender  from  France 
the  latter  was  arrested  at  the  opera,  as  if  the  French  were 
specially  desirous  of  showing  that  even  in  Paris  the  English 
ministers  controlled  the  police. 


422  THE   EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

The  eight  years  following  this  peace  were  the  most  flour- 
ishing period  of  French  commerce  during  the  eighteenth 
century.  Into  Lorient,  which  in  1726  was 
•yj&rl'  War.6"  on^Y  a  small  market  town,  were  imported  in 
1736  18,000,000  francs'  worth  of  merchan- 
dise. If  La  Bourdonnais  was  no  longer  at  the  Isle  of 
France  his  memory  and  his  teachings  lived  there  still. 
Bourbon  became  a  great  agricultural  colony.  At  the 
Antilles,  Guadeloupe,  Martinique,  and  above  all  St.  Do- 
mingo attained  a  prosperity  which  reacted  favorably  upon 
the  merchant  cities  of  the  parent  state:  upon  Nantes  and 
Bordeaux,  which  still  recall  with  regret  those  palmy  days ; 
upon  Marseilles,  which  in  addition  enjoyed  all  the  com- 
merce of  the  Levant  in  the  Mediterranean,  where  she  was 
without  a  rival.  The  sugar  and  coffee  of  the  French 
Antilles  drove  similar  products  of  the  English  colonies 
from  the  European  market.  Louisiana,  so  long  time  lan- 
guishing, found  in  the  freedom  of  trade  granted  her  in  1731 
a  prosperity  such  as  the  mother  country  had  not  been  able 
to  bestow. 

The  last  maritime  war  had  only  caused  the  suspension  of 
this  commercial  movement.  On  cessation  of  that  war  it 
resumed  its  course  with  an  energy  which  the  government 
itself  supported ;  for  despite  the  inertness  of  Louis  XV.  and 
the  wretched  influence  of  Mme.  de  Pompadour  the  increas- 
ing force  of  public  opinion  imposed  upon  the  government 
certain  men  and  a  certain  tendency.  Thus  the  Marquis 
d'Argenson  had  been  called  in  1744  to  the  ministry  of  for- 
eign affairs,  and  that  of  the  marine  was  given  to  Rouille  and 
to  de  Machault,  who  put  forth  praiseworthy  efforts  to  restore 
the  navy.  In  1754  were  counted  in  the  ports  60  ships,  31 
frigates,  and  21  other  vessels.  England  with  her  243  war 
vessels,  of  which  131  were  ships  of  the  line,  could  not  have 
been  jealous  of  this  navy,  which,  though  imposing  in  num- 
bers, was  in  want  of  everything.  She  was  alarmed,  how- 
ever, at  this  resurrection  of  French  naval  strength,  specially 
at  the  progress  of  French  commerce,  which  had  received  an 
energetic  impulse  from  the  doubling  of  the  bounty,  orig- 
inally decreed  by  Machault  in  1740  at  2^  francs  per  ton; 
and  she  easily  found  a  cause  of  rupture. 

Peace  bought  at  any  price  is  made  badly.  Mme.  de 
Pompadour  had  said  to  the  plenipotentiaries  sent  in  1748  to 
Aix-la-Chapelle:  "Remember  not  to  return  without  peace; 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  423 

the  king  wishes  it."  As  a  natural  result  what  might 
have  been  kept  Avas  given  up,  and  care  had  not  been  taken 
to  adjust  all  the  differences.  France  had  two  magnificent 
possessions  in  America,  Canada  and  Louisiana,  that  is  to 
say,  the  St.  Lawrence  and  the  Mississippi,  the  two  vastest 
rivers  of  North  America,  which  continent  she  thus  con- 
trolled at  the  two  ends.  Commissioners  were  appointed  to 
determine  the  frontier.  They  could  not  agree;  the  colo- 
nists, mixing  the  Indians  up  with  their  quarrels,  commenced 
hostilities.  Washington,  then  a  youth,  attained  distinction 
in  these  troubles,  but  at  first  in  an  unfortunate  manner. 
The  detachment  which  he  commanded  surprised  and  slew 
Jumonville,  a  French  officer,  with  all  his  escort,  who  was 
carrying  to  the  English  a  summons  to  evacuate  the  valley  of 
the  Ohio  and  to  retire  to  the  other  side  of  the  Alleghanies. 
This  was  the  first  blood  shed  in  the  struggle  (May  28,  1754). 
In  1755  without  declaration  of  war  the  English  admiral 
Boscawen  captured  two  French  ships  of  the  line;  the  min- 
istry protested,  but  remained  six  months  inactive  without 
joining  deeds  to  words;  during  those  six  months  the  English 
took  from  the  French  more  than  300  merchant  vessels  whose 
cargoes  were  estimated  to  be  worth  38,000,000  francs,  and 
whose  crews  comprised  10,000  sailors.  The  majority  of  the 
latter  were  then  forced  to  serve  in  the  English  ships.  The 
French  government  was  obliged  to  confess  that  war  had 
begun  and  to  resign  itself  to  the  fact. 

It  was  for  the  interest  of  France  to  preserve  the  exclusive- 
ly maritime  character  of  this  war,  and  to  keep  all  her  forces 
united  for  the  duel  with  England.  That  country,  however, 
had  a  far  different  design.  The  English  ministry  with  its 
gold  again  let  loose  the  continental  war.  This  was  readily 
accepted  by  Prussia,  who  felt  herself  somewhat  imperiled 
by  an  unexpected  intimacy  on  the  part  of  France  and  Aus- 
tria. The  years  of  peace  which  had  elapsed  had  been 
better  employed  by  no  prince  than  by  Frederick  II.  He 
had  attached  to  himself  Silesia  by  wise  measures:  he  had 
undertaken  a  great  reformatory  work  in  justice  and  finance; 
and  in  1744  had  incorporated  into  his  kingdom  West  Fries- 
land,  of  which  his  family  had  so  long  had  the  expectancy. 
But  his  wit  sometimes  marred  his  policy.  By  his  too  well 
merited  epigrams  he  had  wounded  the  Czarina  Elizabeth 
and  Mme.  de  Pompadour.  Unfortunately  those  were  still 
days  when  the  personal  resentments  of  princes  and  favorites 


424  THE   EIGHTEENTH  CENTUR  Y.        [BOOK  VI. 

had  more  influence  than  the  interests  of  the  people.  Maria 
Theresa  beheld  the  growth  of  this  alienation  and  nourished 
it  carefully  in  the  hope  of  turning  it  to  the  profit  of  her 
implacable  resentment  against  Prussia.  She  could  not  see 
a  Silesian  without  weeping.  Peace  was  barely  signed  before 
she  made  ready  for  war,  so  regulating  her  army  and  her 
finances  that  with  fewer  provinces  than  her  father  she  pos- 
sessed more  soldiers  and  larger  revenues.  She  replaced  the 
intriguing  ministers  of  Charles  VI.  by  a  skillful  statesman, 
the  celebrated  Kaunitz;  and  as  soon  as  she  thought  wise 
she  proposed  to  the  cabinet  of  Versailles  an  alliance  on  the 
following  terms:  restitution  of  Silesia  to  Austria,  cession  of 
the  Netherlands  to  a  Bourbon  of  the  Spanish  branch,  and 
of  Mons  and  Luxemburg  to  France.  A  friendly  note 
from  Maria  Theresa  to  Mine,  de  Pompadour,  in  which  the 
haughty  empress  called  herself  "the  very  good  friend"  of 
that  parvenu,  brought  about  the  reversal  of  a  policy  pur- 
sued two  centuries  by  France.  The  treaty  of  Versailles 
(1756),  advantageous  only  to  Austria,  for  the  promise  of  the 
Netherlands  was  withdrawn,  united  the  two  powers  whose 
rivalry  had  caused  so  much  blood  to  flow.  The  Czarina 
Elizabeth,  who  did  not  pardon  the  biting  tongue  of  Fred- 
erick II.,  Sweden,  which  regretted  Pomerania,  Saxony, 
which  wished  to  expand,  joined  the  alliance.  Thus  Austria 
became  the  friend  of  France  and  the  enemy'of  England,  her 
former  ally,  and  France  was  going  to  attack  Prussia  after 
fighting  so  recently  on  its  side.  The  entire  system  of 
European  alliances  had  changed. 

France,  still  compelled  to  fight  with  both  hands,  first 
struck  a  vigorous  blow.  To  the  attack  of  Admiral  Bos- 
cawen  she  replied  by  dispatching  against  Minorca,  then  an 
English  possession,  a  squadron  and  an  army.  The  former, 
commanded  by  La  Galissonniere,  defeated  the  English  fleet 
under  Byng;  the  latter,  under  Marshal  de  Richelieu, 
carried  the  fortress,  reputed  impregnable,  of  Port  Mahon. 
This  was  one  of  the  finest  feats  of  arms  during  the  century. 
England  avenged  herself  for  this  defeat  as  Carthage  for- 
merly did:  the  unfortunate  Byng  was  condemned  to  death 
and  shot  on  board  his  ship. 

On  the  Continent  the  war  commenced  by  an  irruption 
into  Saxony  of  the  King  of  Prussia,  who,  as  always,  fore- 
stalled his  enemies.  He  surrounded  the  Saxons  in  their 
camp  at  Pirna.  The  Austrians  approaching  to  extricate 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  425 

them,  he  hastened  to  encounter  them  in  Bohemia,  beat 
them  at  Lowositz,  and  then  returned,  to  capture  the  entire 
Saxon  army,  which  he  incorporated  with  his  troops.  France 
next  declared  the  treaties  of  Westphalia  violated  and  sent 
two  armies  into  the  field,  one  under  Marshal  d'Estrees  to 
Westphalia,  and  one  under  Marshal  Soubise  toward  the 
Main.  Attacked  by  all  his  neighbors  and  without  other 
support  than  England,  Frederick,  notwithstanding  his 
genius,  would  have  been  unable  to  defend  himself  against 
this  formidable  coalition  if  the  allies  had  put  some  concert 
into  their  operations.  He  was  aided  moreover  by  the  folly 
or  thoughtlessness  of  the  French  generals,  Soubise  and 
Richelieu,  and  by  the  tardiness  of  Daun,  the  Austrian 
generalissimo.  From  Saxony,  which  he  had  occupied 
suddenly  and  boldly,  he  returned  to  Bohemia  and  gained 
the  bloody  battle  of  Prague.  Beaten  in  his  turn  near  that 
city  at  Kollin  by  Daun  (1757),  he  was  forced  in  his  retreat 
to  divide  his  forces,  which  exposed  him  to  new  reverses. 
Meanwhile  on  the  east  the  Russians  took  from  him  Memel 
and  defeated  one  of  his  lieutenants  at  Joegerndorf,  but  did 
not  know  how  to  make  the  most  of  their  successes ;  on  the 
west  d'Estrees  gained  over  the  English  the  battle  of  Has- 
tembeck,  which  gave  Hanover  to  the  French,  while  another 
French  army  marched  rapidly  upon  Magdeburg  and  Saxony. 
Thus  the  circle  of  enemies  by  which  Frederick  was  sur- 
rounded drew  closer  each  day  about  him  (1757).  He 
begged  for  peace.  They  believed  him  to  be  at  bay  and 
peace  was  refused;  then  he  decided,  if  die  he  must,  "to  die 
like  a  king,"  as  he  wrote  Voltaire.  The  incapacity  of  his 
enemies  relieved  him  from  keeping  his  word. 

Richelieu,  who  succeeded  d'Estrees  in  command  of  the 
army  of  Hanover,  shut  up  the  Duke  of  Cumberland  in  an 
inextricable  position  in  the  midst  of  a  marshy  country,  but 
instead  of  taking  him  prisoner  he  granted  him  the  capitula- 
tion of  Closter-Sevin,  which  was  speedily  disavowed  by  the 
English  government,  then  controlled  by  the  famous  William 
Pitt.  Richelieu  had  made  the  blunder  of  not  breaking  up 
that  army,  which  was  to  be  found  intact  on  its  resumption 
of  arms ;  and  the  result  of  two  successful  campaigns  was 
lost.  He  committed  another  error  in  setting  before  his 
officers  and  men  an  example  of  the  most  scandalous  ava- 
rice. On  his  return  to  Paris  he  had  built  from  the  fruit  of 
his  depredations  an  elegant  pavilion,  which  the  public  satir- 


426  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [Book  VI. 

ized  as  the  pavilion  of  Hanover.  The  soldiers,  whose  pil- 
lages he  authorized,  called  him  "good  papa  marauder." 
Discipline  was  thus  relaxed  at  the  very  moment  when  the 
French  encountered  the  Prussian  armies,  the  best  disciplined 
in  Europe, 

To  Soubise,  the  favorite  of  Mme.  de  Pompadour,  had 
fallen  the  difficult  task  of  making  head  against  them.  He 
joined  the  "army  of  execution"  which  the  empire  had 
raised  to  support  Maria  Theresa  and  marched  upon  Saxony. 
Frederick  II.  made  a  rapid  march  from  Silesia  to  the  Saale. 
He  had  only  20,000  men  against  50,000.  He  encamped  not 
far  from  the  famous  villages  of  Jena  and  Auerstadt  at  the 
village  of  Rossbach  upon  the  heights,  concealing  his  cavalry 
in  a  hollow  and  hiding  a  formidable  artillery  behind  the 
tents  of  his  camp.  The  allies  advanced  rashly,  in  disorder, 
with  flourish  of  trumpets,  deceived  by  the  apparent  hesita- 
tion of  the  king  and  believing  him  ready  to  fly.  Suddenly 
the  Prussian  artillery  unmasked  and  thundered;  the  cavalry 
hurled  itself  on  the  left  flank  of  Soubise,  which  that  general 
did  not  suppose  was  menaced;  the  infantry  followed,  and 
the  Franco- German  army  was  dispersed  in  a  few  moments. 
The  Prussians  killed  only  3000  men,  for  there  was  little 
fighting;  but  they  made  7000  prisoners,  captured  63  pieces 
of  cannon,  and  lost  only  400  soldiers. 

Frederick,  letting  Soubise  escape,  returned  against  the 
Austrian s,  drove  them  from  Saxony,  whither  they  had  come 
back,  and  followed  them  into  Silesia,  which  he  retook  from 
them  at  the  battle  of  Lissa,  where  he  repeated  the  maneuver 
of  Rossbach,  menacing  one  wing,  crushing  the  other  (1757). 
Pitt,  afterward  Lord  Chatham,  now  became  at  this  moment 
prime  minister,  and  inspired  England  to  the  greatest  exer- 
tions in  behalf  of  her  ally.  The  king,  in  return  for  the 
numerous  subsidies  Pitt  caused  to  be  voted  for  him,  sent 
one  of  his  lieutenants,  Ferdinand  of  Brunswick,  to  take 
command  of  the  Hanoverian  army,  which,  in  violation  of  its 
parole,  resumed  operations.  Before  that  skillful  general  the 
French  retreated,  recrossing  the  Weser,  the  Ems,  and  the 
Rhine,  after  which  they  \vere  once  more  defeated  at  Cre- 
feld  (1758). 

Napoleon  said  of  these  generals,  whom  a  caprice  of  Mme. 
de  Pompadour  placed  in  command  of  the  French  armies, 
that  all,  generals-in-chief  and  simple  generals,  were  of  the 
most  utter  incapacity.  To  which  we  must  add  that  the 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION   OF  PRUSSIA.  427 

court  quarrels  continued  in  the  camp,  and  that  many  offi- 
cers could  be  accused  with  apparent  truth  of  having,  for 
the  sake  of  ruining  a  rival,  caused  plans  to  miscarry  and 
battles  to  be  lost.  They  were  not  only  most  wretched  tac- 
ticians but  detestable  administrators.  The  armies,  exceed- 
ingly badly  organized,  were  still  worse  equipped.  When 
the  Count  de  Clermont  succeeded  Richelieu  he  had  to 
cashier  eighty  officers.  At  one  time  with  the  army  of 
Soubise  there  were  12,000  wagons  belonging  to  merchants 
and  sutlers.  This  was  not  the  only  evil.  Since  women 
governed,  the  higher  administration  was  submitted  to  the 
most  unreasonable  caprices.  Between  1756  and  1763 
twenty-five  ministers  were  appointed  or  removed,  "toppling 
down  one  after  the  other,"  wrote  Voltaire,  "like  the 
figures  of  a  magic  lantern."  Plans  changed  like  men,  or 
rather  nothing  was  done  and  everything  went  by  chance. 

However,  after  the  shameful  defeats  of  Rossbach  and 
Crefeld,  if  the  generals  were  not  changed,  forces  were  given 
so  superior  to  those  of  the  enemy  that  even  Soubise,  even 
the  Count  de  Clermont,  the  Duke  de  Broglie,  and  Marshal 
Contades  during  the  following  years  almost  balanced  suc- 
cess with  the  Prussians,  Hessians,  and  Hanoverians. 

Soubise  was  on  the  Main  during  the  retreat  of  the  Count 
de  Clermont;  menacing  Hesse,  where  at  Sandershausen 
near  Cassel  de  Broglie  gained  a  slight  advantage,  he  forced 
back  Duke  Ferdinand  and  defeated  a  part  of  his  troops  at 
Lutzelberg  (1758).  The  following  year  de  Broglie  won 
another  and  more  important  success  upon  the  Nidda;  but, 
placed  under  the  orders  of  Contades,  he  obeyed  him  badly, 
and  the  rivalry  of  the  two  generals  brought  about  a  new 
disaster  at  Minden  (August,  1759).  Contades  bore  the 
blame  and  was  removed ;  de  Broglie  took  his  command 
which  consisted  of  more  than  100,000  men.  He  did  not 
know  how  to  employ  them,  and  contented  himself  with  the 
occupation  of  a  few  cities,  such  as  Cassel  and  Minden,  and 
with  a  fortunate  encounter  which  the  Count  of  St.  Germain 
had  at  Corbach  with  the  Prussians  (1760).  A  detachment 
which  he  sent  upon  the  Rhine  succeeded  better  still; 
20,000  Prussians  had  just  captured  Cleves;  de  Castries 
beat  them  at  Clostercamp.  It  was  there  that  the  Chevalier 
d'Assas,  captain  of  a  regiment  from  Auvergne,  sacrificed 
himself.  Falling  into  an  ambuscade  where  the  enemy 
counted  on  surprising  the  French  army,  he  cried  with  all 


428  THE   EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

his  strength:  "Help,  Auvergne!  There  is  the  enemy!" 
He  fell  riddled  by  balls,  as  was  the  sergeant  Dubois,  but 
the  army  was  saved. 

Thus  in  the  west  of  Germany  the  war  had  no  result  save 
the  devastation  of  the  country,  where  the  French  armies 
usually  went  into  winter  quarters.  Toward  the  south  and 
east  Frederick  held  his  own  against  the  Russians  and  Aus- 
trians.  He  said  of  the  former:  "They  are  easier  to  kill  than 
to  conquer."  However,  they  took  from  him  Koenigsberg, 
but  he  beat  them  at  Zorndorff  near  Custrin  (1758).  A 
defeat  which  the  Austrians  inflicted  on  him  at  Hochkir- 
chen  in  Lusatia  balanced  this  success.  The  Russians  even 
had  their  revenge  the  following  year  (1759)  at  Zullichau 
and  Kunnersdorff,  where  20,000  men  on  each  side  were 
left  upon  the  field  of  battle;  and  Frederick  would  have  been 
in  a  critical  position  if  his  adversaries  had  known  how  to 
take  advantage  of  their  victory.  The  brilliant  success  of 
Prince  Ferdinand  at  Minden  (August  1759)  over  Marshal 
de  Contades  revived  his  hopes.  He  improved  this  return 
of  fortune  to  beg  for  peace ;  his  enemies,  seeing  in  this  step 
only  a  sign  of  distress,  refused  it  a  second  time  (1760). 
He  undeceived  them,  beat  Laudon  at  Liegnitz,  delivered 
his  capital  which  had  been  surprised  by  the  Russians  and 
Austrians,  forced  the  lines  of  Daun  who  held  a  formidable 
position  near  Torgau,  and  held  two-thirds  of  Saxony,  while 
his  lieutenants  baffled  the  plans  of  the  Swedes  and  French 
at  the  north  and  west. 

But  these  "labors  of  Hercules"  had  exhausted  the 
strength  of  the  king  and  his  people.  During  all  the  cam- 
paign of  1761  he  held  himself  on  the  defensive.  These  tac- 
tics succeeded  badly.  Though  de  Broglie  was  beaten  at 
Villinghausen  because  he  depended  on  Soubise,  who  did 
not  assist  him,  Frederick  II.  lost  Schweidnitz  and  Dresden, 
and  was  deprived  of  subsidies  from  England.  Happily 
for  him  the  Czarina  Elizabeth  died  at  the  beginning  of  1762, 
and  Peter  III.  forthwith  declared  the  neutrality  of  Russia. 
Sweden  at  the  same  time  withdrew  from  the  conflict.  Tran- 
quil at  the  east  and  north,  Frederick  acted  with  vigor  in 
Silesia,  which  he  recovered,  and  in  Saxony,  where  Prince 
Henry  won  the  battle  of  Freiberg.  He  not  only  gained 
battles;  he  gained  also  public  opinion.  If  in  the  preceding 
war  the  virtues  and  courage  of  Maria  Theresa  had  excited 
enthusiasm,  now  the  heroic  perseverance  of  Frederick  II., 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  429 

and  the  talents  he  displayed  in  extricating  himself  from  the 
most  hopeless  situations,  increased  daily  the  number  of  his 
admirers.  His  mother  tongue,  which  he  despised,  became 
animate  to  sing  his  victories,  and  all  Europe  recited  the 
thrilling  verses  which  he  wrote  to  Voltaire. 

France  had  sustained  the  war  upon  the  continent  without 
too  heavy  loss,  but  also  without  much  glory,  because  she 
was  fighting  three  against  one — France,  Austria,  and  Russia 
against  Frederick  II.  alone.  Upon  the  water  she  was  con- 
tending with  an  enemy  whose  crushing  superiority  left  the 
French  sailors  the  hope  of  only  a  few  isolated  successes. 
The  naval  victory  of  La  Galissonniere  in  1756  was  not 
repeated.  However,  the  honor  of  the  flag  was  brilliantly  sus- 
tained in  several  indecisive  encounters.  Thus  that  same 
year  in  the  vicinity  of  Rochefort  two  French  frigates  attacked 
an  English  frigate  and  an  English  ship  and  totally  disabled 
them.  Maureville,  one  of  the  French  captains,  having  an 
arm  carried  away,  cried  from  the  lower  deck  to  his  sailors: 
"Courage,  friends,  heavy  firing!  I  forbid  you  to  strike!" 
There  were  many  like  exploits.  But  while  England  lavished 
all  her  solicitude  upon  her  marine,  the  French  government 
allowed  its  colonies  to  lack  ships,  soldiers,  and  money. 
Unhappily  divisions  relaxed  discipline ;  the  gentlemen  offi- 
cers, called  red  officers,  full  of  disdain  for  the  plebeian  or 
blue  officers,  who  in  time  of  peace  remained  in  the  garri- 
sons, refused  to  obey  them.  Thence  arose  difficulties,  dis- 
trust, and  consequently  a  bad  service.  The  English  block- 
aded the  French  ports;  not  a  boat  went  out  that  did  not  fall 
into  their  hands;  thirty-seven  vessels  of  the  line  and  fifty- 
six  frigates  were  thus  captured,  burned,  or  perished  on  the 
rocks.  Descents  effected  by  the  English  on  the  coasts  of 
Normandy  and  Brittany,  at  Cherbourg  and  St.  Malo,  had 
no  lasting  consequences;  still  they  showed  that  the  French 
territory  could  be  safely  violated,  since  the  fleet  could  no 
longer  protect  the  shores.  In  one  of  these  attempts  upon 
St.  Malo  the  enemy  lost  at  St.  Cast  5000  men,  whom  the 
Duke  of  Aiguillon  and  the  nobility  of  Brittany,  rising  as  one 
man,  slew  or  captured  (1758).  But  the  following  year 
Admiral  La  Clue,  who  had  only  seven  vessels  against  four- 
teen, was  beaten  at  Cape  Ste.  Marie;  and  the  folly  of 
Conflans  brought  about  the  destruction  of  the  fleet  of  Brest. 
In  1763  the  English  made  themselves  masters  of  Belle  Isle. 
They  had  therefore  in  the  Bay  of  Biscay,  in  sight  of  Nantes, 


430  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

between  Brest  and  Rochefort,  a  position  as  advantageous  as 
on  the  other  side  of  Brittany  was  afforded  by  their  posses- 
sion of  St.  Malo  between  Cherbourg  and  Brest.  All  the 
French  seacoast  from  Dunkirk  to  Bayonne  was,  as  it  were, 
blockaded. 

Dupleix  had  been  recalled  in  1754.  If  France  had  sent 
him  money  and  veteran  soldiers  instead  of  dispatching  him, 
as  he  complained,  only  the  vilest  rabble,  India  might  now 
perhaps  be  French  instead  of  English  territory.  He  died  at 
Paris  in  misery  in  1763.  Lally,  an  Irishman  in  the  service 
of  France,  without  possessing  his  lofty  views,  had  at  least 
unconquerable  courage.  But  compelled,  in  order  to  obtain 
money,  to  make  war  upon  the  Indian  rajahs  fifty  leagues 
inland,  he  could  not  prevent  the  English  under  the  com- 
mand of  Lord  Clive  from  gaining  the  advantage.  How- 
ever, he  barely  missed  recapturing  Madras;  the  breach  was 
opened,  he  ordered  the  assault,  his  soldiers  refused  to  march 
because  they  Avere  not  paid.  In  his  turn  he  was  besieged 
in  Pondicherry,  where  with  700  soldiers  he  defended  him- 
self nine  months  against  22,000.  The  English,  at  last  mas- 
ters of  the  city,  drove  out  the  inhabitants  and  razed  it  to 
the  ground.  That  was  the  death  blow  to  French  domina- 
tion in  India ;  from  that  it  has  never  recovered. 

Likewise  in  Canada  the  French  flag  was  at  first  raised 
high,  and  then  thrown  down.  The  marquises  of  Vaudreuil 
and  of  Montcalm  captured  the  forts  of  Oswego  on  Lake 
Ontario  (1756)  and  William  Henry  on  Lake  St.  George 
(1757),  bulwarks  of  the  English  possessions.  But  in  1759 
they  had  only  5000  soldiers  with  whom  to  oppose  40,000 
men,  and  the  colony  was  without  provisions,  lead,  and 
powder.  Mine,  de  Pompadour  annually  cost  France  three  or 
four  million  francs;  through  lack  of  an  equal  sum  the  4000 
soldiers  who  offered  to  settle  in  Canada  after  the  war,  and 
who  might  have  changed  the  issue  of  the  struggle,  could 
not  be  sent  there.  The  enemy  besieged  Quebec;  Montcalm 
gave  battle  to  save  the  city;  mortally  wounded,  he  still 
shouted  to  his  soldiers,  whose  idol  he  had  become  by  his 
chivalrous  courage:  "Forward!  let  us  keep  the  field  of 
battle!"  The  English  General  Wolfe,  having  received  three 
wounds,  in  the  agony  of  death  heard  his  soldiers  shout: 
"They  fly!"  He  raised  himself  a  moment  and  said:  "I 
die  content."  Vaudreuil  struggled  some  time  longer,  but 
finally  Canada  was  lost.  So  too  were  Guadeloupe,  San 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  43* 

Domingo,  Martinique,  Granada,  St.  Vincent,  Lucia,  Ta- 
bago,  St.  Louis  du  Senegal,  and  the  island  of  Goree. 

An  able  minister,  the  Duke  de  Choiseul,  then  assumed 
the  chief  control  in  French  affairs.  Mme.  de  Pompadour 
had  recalled  him  from  the  embassy  at  Vienna  to  give  him 
in  1758  the  portfolio  of  foreign  affairs,  which  in  1761  he 
exchanged  for  that  of  war.  Two  years  later  he  assumed 
also  that  of  marine,  and  gave  the  department  of  foreign 
affairs  to  his  cousin,  the  Duke  of  Praslin.  Choiseul  main- 
tained the  Austrian  alliance,  but  he  contracted  another. 
He  wished  to  unite  as  in  a  bundle  all  the  branches  of  the 
house  of  Bourbon,  then  regnant  in  France,  Spain,  the  Two 
Sicilies,  Parma,  and  Piacenza.  This  was  the  realization  of 
the  prayer  of  Louis  XIV. ;  it  was  also  the  bestowal  upon 
France  of  the  Spanish  navy.  This  treaty,  famous  under  the 
name  of  the  "family  compact,"  was  signed  August  15, 
1761.  The  contracting  powers  mutually  guaranteed  each 
other's  states.  England  forthwith  declared  Avar  against 
Spain  and  brought  Portugal  over  to  her  side.  The  navy  of 
France  had  fallen  so  low  and  that  of  Spain  was  so  languish- 
ing that  there  was  for  the  moment  nothing  to  hope  from 
their  union.  Spain,  entering  the  lists  too  late,  experienced 
only  losses :  she  saw  herself  stripped  of  Manilla,  the  Philip- 
pines, Havana,  twelve  ships  of  the  line,  and  prizes  valued  at 
109,000,000  francs.  An  invasion  of  Portugal  had  no  result. 

However,  in  1762,  victors  or  vanquished,  the  European 
powers  were  weary  of  a  war  which  was  ruining  them  all  and 
had  caused  the  death  of  a  million  men.  For  her  part, 
France  had  expended  1,350,000,000  francs.  England  had 
attained  her  object,  the  destruction  of  the  French  merchant 
and  military  marine.  But  her  very  conquests  were  exhaust- 
ing her  treasury,  her  public  debt  was  increasing,  and  recruit- 
ments becoming  difficult;  for  in  order  to  preserve  the 
empire  of  the  ocean,  which  she  had  seized,  constantly 
increasing  armaments  were  necessary.  Prussia,  without 
commerce,  without  manufactures,  devastated,  depopulated, 
was  kept  erect  only  by  the  energy  of  her  king.  Austria, 
which  had  hoped  to  deprive  her  of  Silesia,  despaired  of  suc- 
cess. France  and  England  signed  preliminaries  which 
resulted  (February  10,  1763)  in  the  treaty  of  Paris. 

England  acquired  Canada  with  its  60,000  French  inhabit- 
ants, Acadia,  the  island  of  Cape  Breton,  Grenada  and  the 
Grenadines,  St.  Vincent,  Dominica,  Tabago,  Senegal,  and 


43 2  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

in  Europe  Minorca.  France  retained  the  right  of  fishing 
on  the  coasts  of  Newfoundland  and  in  the  Gulf  of  St.  Law- 
rence, together  with  the  islands  of  St.  Pierre  and  Miquelon, 
which,  however,  she  could  not  fortify.  She  recovered 
Guadeloupe,  Marie  Galante,  La  Desirade,  and  Martinique, 
and  obtained  St.  Lucia;  the  island  of  Goree  was  restored 
to  her  in  Senegal,  and  Belle  Isle  on  the  coast  of  Brittany. 
But  she  was  to  demolish  the  fortifications  of  Dunkirk  on  the 
seaward  side,  and  endured  in  that  city  the  permanent 
and  insulting  presence  of  an  English  commissioner,  who  was 
to  watch  that  not  a  single  stone  was  turned  on  the  quays 
where  Jean  Bart  had  embarked.  In  the  East  Indies  Pon- 
dicherry,  Mahe,  and  three  small  factories  were  left  her  on 
condition  that  she  should  not  dispatch  to  them  any  troops. 
As  Spain,  though  recovering  Cuba  and  Manilla,  gave  up  to 
England  Florida  and  Pensacola  Bay,  France  made  amends 
to  her  shortly  after  by  the  cession  of  Louisiana.  "The  war 
had  commenced  for  two  or  three  -wretched  dwellings;  the 
English  gained  by  it  2000  leagues  of  territory."  The  treaty 
of  Hubertsburg  between  Maria  Theresa  and  Frederick  II. 
confirmed  the  latter  in  the  possession  of  Silesia. 

Frederick  II.  had  shown  himself  almost  as  great  in  coun- 
cil as  in  the  field  of  battle.  After  having  saved  his  country 
from  dismemberment,  after  having  gloriously  constituted  a 
new  people  in  Europe,  and  having  raised  that  people  to  the 
rank  of  a  great  nation,  he  rescued  it  from  misery  by  an  able 
and  vigilant  administration.  He  wrested  an  entire  province 
from  the  water  by  draining  the  marshes  which  bordered  the 
Oder  below  Custrin,  and  he  gave  it  inhabitants  by  attract- 
ing foreigners.  He  planted  many  mulberry  trees;  he  estab- 
lished manufactories  of  silk,  cloth,  and  velvet,  and  a  sugar 
refinery  at  Berlin,  which  furnished  sugar  to  all  the  provinces. 
He  excavated  the  great  canal  of  Plauen  between  the  Elbe 
and  the  Oder;  that  of  Bromberg,  by  which  the  Elbe  and 
the  Vistula  are  connected;  and  finally  that  of  the  Swine. 
He  also  built  Swinemunde,  the  port  of  Stettin,  a  Soldiers' 
Hospital  at  Berlin,  and  the  castle  of  Sans-Souci,  which  was 
his  favorite  residence.  The  Seven  Years'  War  decreased 
the  population  of  Prussia  500,000  souls;  14,500  houses  had 
been  burned.  In  Silesia,  Pomerania,  and  the  New  March, 
the  peasants  harnessed  themselves  to  the  plow — 60,000 
horses  had  been  lost  to  tillage.  "It  was, "  said  Frederick  II., 
"a  new  creation  to  undertake."  He  recommenced  all  his 


CHAP.  XXV.]  CREATION  OF  PRUSSIA.  433 

works  of  improvement,  draining  marshes,  covering  sandy 
plains  with  plantations,  constructing  dykes  to  recapture  from 
the  sea  what  it  had  seized  during  a  great  tempest  in  1724. 

In  order  to  aid  his  people  in  rebuilding  the  ruins  made 
by  war  he  distributed  in  the  provinces  in  twenty-three  years 
25,000,000  Prussian  crowns  and  created  a  system  of  landed 
credit  which  the  French  imitated  not  long  ago.  He  reor- 
ganized public  instruction  and  reformed  the  administration 
of  justice  with  the  aid  of  the  great  Chancellor  Cocceii.  The 
latter,  said  the  king,  was  "a  sage  who  would  have  done  honor 
to  the  Greek  republics."  He  moreover  abolished  torture." 
One  day  seeing  a  peasant  condemned  by  an  unjust  sentence, 
he  set  aside  the  decision  and  caused  to  be  published  in  the 
journals :  "The  humblest  of  peasants  and  even  the  beggar  is 
a  man  equally  with  the  king.  Before  justice  all  are  equal." 

The  prophecy  of  Prince  Eugene  was  being  verified.  This 
electorate,  changed  into  a  kingdom,  was  becoming  dangerous 
for  Austria.  After  having  torn  from  her  her  fairest  prov- 
ince it  monopolized  her  influence  in  the  empire.  Although 
at  Sans-Souci  neither  Hermann  nor  Luther  was  greatly 
respected,  and  although  the  cry,  "Vivat  Teutonia!"  was  not 
repeated  there,  nevertheless  the  effort  was  already  being 
made  to  assume  the  character  of  a  power  exclusively  Ger- 
man and  Protestant  in  opposition  to  Austria,  a  Catholic  and 
half-Slavic  state,  whose  imperial  mantle  was  only  a  patch- 
work of  many  pieces.  When  in  1777  the  Elector  of  Bavaria 
died  without  children  Maria  Theresa  purchased  the  succes- 
sion from  the  direct  heir,  the  Elector  Palatine.  The  trans- 
action was  advantageous  to  Austria,  to  whom  it  gave  an 
unbroken  territory  from  the  frontiers  of  Turkey  as  far  as 
the  Rhine,  that  is,  almost  all  southern  Germany.  Frederick 
opposed  the  scheme  and  was  supported  by  the  courts  of 
Versailles  and  St.  Petersburg.  After  a  bloodless  campaign 
the  Franco-Russian  mediation  brought  about  the  peace  of 
Teschen  (1779).  The  Duke  of  Deux-Ponts,  heir  of  the 
Elector  Palatine,  received  the  Bavarian  succession,  Saxony 
and  Mecklenburg  obtained  indemnities,  and  Austria  gained 
a  few  districts  by  which  the  Tyrol  was  joined  to  her  other 
dominions.  Frederick  was  satisfied  with  the  glory  of  hav- 
ing been  the  arbiter  of  Germany.  That  was  already  a 
sufficient  advantage  for  the  successor  of  the  Brandenburg 
electors.  But  there  was  one  other:  Prussia  was  gaining 
much  from  the  fact  that  Austria  did  not  become  stronger. 


CHAPTER  XXVI. 
MARITIME   AND   COLONIAL   POWER   OF   ENGLAND. 


England  from  1688  to  1763. — The  English  East  India  Company. 


THE  revolution  of  1688  had  had  as  its  results:  at  home, 
the  revival  of  national  liberties,  both  political  and  religious; 
abroad,  the  substitution  of  England  for 
"  *  exhausted  Holland  as  the  antagonist  of 
France  and  of  Louis  XIV.  The  wars  of 
the  League  of  Augsburg  and  of  the  Spanish  succession 
ruined  the  navy  of  France  and  permitted  her  rival  to  grasp 
the  scepter  of  the  seas.  War  is  not  commonly  favorable  to 
public  liberty;  however,  England  strengthened  hers  during 
the  great  struggle.  At  home  the  glorious  William  III.  met 
only  with  annoyance  and  opposition;  he  was  compelled  to 
dismiss  his  Dutch  guard;  his  revenue  was  parsimoniously 
doled  out  to  him  by  the  Houses;  and  to  obtain  a  few  subsi- 
dies he  was  obliged  to  sanction  the  Triennial  Act  (1694), 
which  enacted  that  no  Parliament  should  last  more  than 
three  years.  So  he  was  seen  more  often  at  The  Hague 
than  at  London ;  it  was  said  that  in  England  he  was  only 
a  stadtholder,  while  in  Holland  he  was  a  king.  His  death 
was  caused  by  a  fall  from  his  horse  (March  16,  1702).  His 
wife,  Queen  Mary,  had  seven  years  before  preceded  him  to 
the  tomb,  and  as  he  left  no  children,  the  second  daughter 
of  James  II.  succeeded.  In  1696  he  had  commenced  a 
hospital  for  disabled  soldiers  at  Greenwich,  a  place  already 
famous  for  the  observatory  which  Charles  II.  had  founded 
there. 

Good  Queen  Anne,  a  zealous  Protestant,  had  married  in 
1683  the  Prince  of  Denmark,  brother  of  Christian  V.,  who 
died  in  1703.  She  had  as  favorite  until  1710  Lady 
Churchill,  Duchess  of  Marlborough,  wife  of  the  general  of 
that  name,  whom  Lady  Marlborough' s  proud  and  haughty 


CHAP.  XXVI.]  POWER  OF  ENGLAND.  435 

character  then  brought  into  disgrace.  The  most  important 
domestic  event  during  the  reign  of  Anne  was  the  union  of 
England  and  Scotland  in  a  single  state  under  the  name  of 
Great  Britain.  Thenceforward  there  was  but  one  Parlia- 
ment ;  Scotland  was  represented  by  sixteen  peers  in  the 
House  of  Lords,  and  by  forty-five  members  in  the  House 
of  Commons  (May  i,  1707).  Abroad  Admiral  Rook  took 
Gibraltar  (1704),  and  Maryborough  gained  the  victories  of 
Hochstadt, or  Blenheim  (1705),  Ramillies  (1706),  Oudenarde 
(1708),  and  Malplaquet  (1709).  His  disgrace,  merited  by 
his  peculations,  and  the  parliamentary  revolution  of  1710, 
which  brought  the  Tories  to  power  in  place  of  the  Whigs,  led 
to  the  treaty  of  Utrecht  (1713).  The  Whigs  were  identified 
with  the  revolution  of  1688  and  had  consequently  been  very 
zealous  for  the  war  against  France.  We  have  considered 
the  principal  advantages  this  treaty  conferred  on  England. 
Another  treaty,  concluded  in  170.3,  with  the  court  of  Lis- 
bon had  important  consequences.  The  Portuguese  agreed 
to  always  receive  the  manufactured  products  of  England, 
and  Great  Britain  the  wines  of  Portugal,  on  which  the  cus- 
toms duty  was  to  be  one-third  of  that  imposed  on  the  wines 
of  France.  Portugal  therefore  became  an  English  market; 
all  the  gold  of  Brazil  hardly  sufficed  to  pay  the  workmen  of 
Manchester  and  Leeds,  and  foreign  importations  rendered 
the  development  of  national  Portuguese  industry  impossible. 
There  were  between  the  son  of  James  II.,  legitimate  heir 
to  the  crown  according  to  the  claims  of  birth,  and  the  prince 
whom  an  act  of  Parliament  called  to  the  throne,  George  of 
Brunswick-Luneburg,  great-grandson  of  James  I.  on  the 
side  of  his  mother,  Sophia,  Dowager  Electress  of  Hanover, 
fifty-seven  persons  whose  rights  were  superior  to  those  of 
the  elector.  But  George  was  a  Protestant  and  a  violent 
enemy  of  Louis  XIV.  That  was  a  sufficient  title  with  the 
English.  He  was  a  foreigner,  but  England  has  never  since 
the  Norman  conquest  had  sovereigns  of  her  own  blood,  and 
she  has  been  none  the  worse  on  that  account.  George  I. 
did  not  know  a  word  of  English  nor  of  the  constitution 
which  he  swore  to  observe:  he  was  let  off  by  leaving  the 
government  in  the  hands  of  Robert  Walpole,  chief  of  the 
Whig  party,  whom  he  called  to  power.  This  sudden  about- 
face  and  the  condemnation  of  two  Tory  leaders,  Ormond 
and  Bolingbroke,  persuaded  the  Stuart  pretender,  who  was 
called  the  Chevalier  of  St.  George,  that  the  moment  was  ripe 


436  THE   EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

for  a  restoration.  A  movement  took  place  in  Scotland 
(1715).  He  disembarked  there  at  the  commencement  of  the 
following  year,  but  the  battle  of  Sheriffmuir  in  the  county 
of  Perth  caused  the  destruction  of  all  his  hopes,  and  he  was 
reduced  to  seeking  safety  under  a  disguise.  Two  lords 
were  beheaded,  other  insurgents  hanged  or  quartered,  a 
thousand  deported  to  the  colonies.  This  success  was  profit- 
able to  the  royalty.  Walpole,  willing  to  increase  a  power  of 
which  he  was  the  depository,  had  Parliament  declared  sep- 
tennial. He  thus  had  less  often  to  renew  his  bargains  wyith 
the  members. 

George,  menaced  by  the  Pretender,  and  the  Regent  of 
France,  menaced  by  Philip  V.,  drew  together.  Walpole, 
fallen  from  power  in  1717,  but  four  years  after  restored  to 
the  government,  which  he  administered  until  1742,  pro- 
posed to  avoid  foreign  and  domestic  agitations.  In  order 
to  prevent  the  first  he  endeavored,  in  concert  with  the 
French  ministers,  and  especially  with  Fleury,  to  preserve 
peace  in  Europe.  He  succeeded,  save  for  one  short  war 
against  Spain,  which  arose  over  the  question  of  the  India 
Company  founded  by  Austria  at  Ostend,  and  which  was 
marked  by  a  fruitless  attempt  of  the  Spaniards  against 
Gibraltar  (1727).  At  home  he  bought  the  majority  in  Par- 
liament, calmed  the  country,  attached  the  mass  of  the 
nation  more  and  more  to  the  principles  of  the  revolution 
of  1688  and  to  the  princes  who  were  its  representatives;  at 
the  same  time  he  directed  English  commerce  into  a  path  of 
ever  advancing  prosperity. 

When  George  I.  died  in  1727  his  son,  George  II.,  suc- 
ceeded. They  had  lived  very  badly  together.  Apparently 
the  new  king  was  to  change  everything  in  the  government, 
but  he  changed  nothing,  inasmuch  as  he  kept  Walpole. 
Financial  disorders  and  scandalous  embezzlements,  which 
were  brought  to  light  by  trials,  and  were  necessary  results 
of  the  corrupting  system  of  the  prime  minister,  marked  the 
beginning  of  this  reign.  Satires  of  every  sort  were  aimed  at 
Walpole.  He  muzzled  the  press  and  subjected  the  theater 
to  a  rigorous  censorship.  The  opposition  thundered 
against  him,  the  people  burned  him  in  effigy ;  he  paid  a 
little  dearer  for  votes  in  support  of  the  ministry  and  kept 
his  majority.  However,  public  spirit  awoke,  and  even  the 
power  which  he  had  developed,  the  business  spirit,  over 
threw  him.  In  1739  the  nation  forced  Walpole  to  declare 


CHAP.  XXVI.]  POWER  OF  ENGLAND.  437 

war  against  Spain,  which  refused  to  open  its  harbors  to 
English  commerce.  This  war  became  merged  in  1742  in 
the  general  conflagration.  Walpole  could  no  longer  con- 
tinue minister  of  this  new  policy;  he  fell.  He  has  been 
called  a  conscience  jobber,  and  he  boasted  of  knowing  every 
man's  price.  But  if  he  perverted  the  institutions  of  his 
country  he  did  not  destroy  them;  and  as  he  was  the  real 
ruler  under  the  son  just  as  under  the  father,  the  country 
became  accustomed  to  the  constitutional  formula,  "The 
king  reigns  and  does  not  govern." 

The  general  war  which  overthrew  Walpole  was  that  of 
the  Austrian  succession.  England  could  not  allow  her 
ancient  continental  ally  to  succumb.  The  successor  of 
Walpole,  Lord  Carteret,  sent  an  army  into  Germany.  The 
king  wished  to  take  command  in  person.  As  Elector  of 
Hanover  he  felt  the  greatest  interest  in  German  affairs,  and 
this  continental  possession,  useless  to  England,  often  ham- 
pered her  policy  in  this  contest  and  in  many  others.  We 
have  seen  that  the  expedition  turned  out  badly,  and  that 
George  II.  extricated  himself  from  a  bad  predicament  at 
Dettingen  only  by  the  blunder  of  one  of  the  French  generals. 
To  the  continental  war  England  gave  only  desultory  atten- 
tion; but  when  Admiral  Mathews  left  the  naval  battle  at 
Toulon  indecisive  public  opinion  demanded  his  removal: 
already  on  the  western  side  of  the  Channel  it  was  no  longer 
admitted  that  England  could  not  be  everywhere  victorious 
upon  the  sea.  The  defeat  of  the  Duke  of  Cumberland,  son 
of  George  II.,  at  Fontenoy  (May  n,  1745)  opened  the 
Netherlands  to  the  French;  the  same  year  an  attempt  made 
by  the  pretender  Charles  Edward,  grandson  of  James  II., 
carried  danger  to  the  very  heart  of  Great  Britain. 

The  latter  prince  after  four  years  waiting  had  obtained 
from  France  a  fleet  and  15,000  soldiers  to  overthrow  the 
house  of  Hanover.  Disembarking  in  Scotland  in  1745,  he 
gathered  around  him  many  Highland  chiefs,  entered  Edin- 
burgh, defeated  General  Cope  at  Prestonpans,  and  penetrated 
as  far  as  Derby,  about  no  miles  distant  from  London. 
Forced  by  the  lawlessness  of  his  soldiers  and  the  indiffer- 
ence of  the  English  Jacobites  to  retreat,  he  nevertheless 
was  the  victor  (January  28)  at  Falkirk,  but  was  utterly 
beaten  at  Culloden  by  the  Duke  of  Cumberland  (April  27). 
Bloody  reprisals  followed.  Five  lords  and  more  than  two 
hundred  persons  were  first  executed.  Charles  Edward,  on 


438  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

whose  head  had  been  put  a  reward  of  30,000  pounds  ster- 
ling, wandered  five  months  from  retreat  to  retreat  in  the 
midst  of  the  greatest  dangers.  He  returned  to  France  thir- 
teen months  after  his  departure.  Scotland  paid  for  this 
disastrous  expedition  with  the  last  remains  of  her  nation- 
ality; the  hereditary  jurisdiction,  sole  vestige  of  the  feudal 
regime,  was  abolished ;  so  too  was  the  clan  system,  as  also 
the  custom  of  wearing  the  Highland  costume  or  plaid,  in 
which  the  design  varied  according  to  the  clan. 

While  this  drama  was  being  enacted  the  victories  of 
Marshal  Saxe  in  the  Netherlands  rendered  useless  the 
successes  of  the  English  in  America.  When  the  treaty 
of  Aix-la-Chapelle  was  signed  (1748)  they  found  they 
had  gained  by  this  war  only  an  increase  of  the  national 
debt,  which  rose  from  fifty  to  eighty  million  pounds 
sterling. 

Walpole  died  in  1748,  three  years  after  his  disgrace. 
The  following  year  Lord  Newcastle  replaced  Lord  Carteret. 
Under  his  ministry  commerce  was  favored,  sea  fisheries 
encouraged  by  bounties,  the  exportation  of  machinery  and 
looms  forbidden,  the  interest  on  the  national  debt  reduced 
from  4  to  3^  per  cent.,  the  army  diminished,  the  city  of 
Halifax  founded  by  veterans  in  Acadia,  or  Nova  Scotia,  a 
province  in  North  America,  which  was  ceded  by  France  in 
1713,  and  another  establishment  formed  upon  the  Mosquito 
coast  on  the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  But  in  1754  one  of  the  minis- 
ters gave  in  his  resignation,  disapproving  the  policy  of  Lord 
Newcastle,  who  risked  engaging  England  in  a  costly  war  in 
consequence  of  alliances  contracted  with  German  princes  for 
the  defense  of  Hanover,  then  menaced  by  the  King  of  Prussia. 
This  minister  was  the  son  of  a  plain  squire,  and  possessed 
an  income  of  hardly  two  hundred  pounds  sterling.  The 
rotten  borough  of  Old  Sarum  had  sent  him  to  Parliament  at 
the  age  of  twenty-seven,  and  his  contemporaries  named  him 
"the  great  commoner."  He  was  William  Pitt.  As  long  as 
Walpole  was  minister  Pitt  sat  on  the  opposition  benches. 
Appointed  in  1746  vice-treasurer  of  Ireland,  privy  council- 
or, and  paymaster  general  of  the  English  troops,  he  distin- 
guished himself  in  these  functions  by  his  wisdom  in  reform, 
his  integrity,  and  his  unselfishness.  In  1756  at  the  fall  of 
the  Duke  of  Newcastle  Pitt  returned  to  office,  but  not  till 
1757  did  he  direct  affairs  as  prime  minister.  During  the  first 
audience  which  he  had  with  the  king  he  said:  "Sire,  grant 


CHAP.  XXVI.]  POWER  OF  ENGLAND.  439 

me  your  confidence;  I  will  deserve  it."  "Deserve  it," 
replied  George  II.,  "and  you  will  obtain  it."  Pitt  kept  his 
word;  only  he  was  the  national  minister  of  England,  and  not 
the  courtier  of  the  Hanoverian  prince.  France  learned  too 
well  his  talents  and  his  hate  during  the  Seven  Years'  War, 
into  which,  as  during  all  the  period  from  174710  1761,  he 
infused  an  energy  which  was  fatal  to  the  French  military 
and  commercial  marine  and  to  the  French  colonies.  Thus 
the  Commons,  proud  of  those  useful  successes,  granted 
everything  without  difficulty  to  the  fortunate  minister.  On 
his  demand  the  army  was  raised  to  175,000  men,  and  he 
obtained  all  the  subsidies  which  he  solicited. 

The  death  of  George  II.  in  1760  brought  to  the  throne 
his  grandson,  George  III.  This  young  prince  of  twenty- 
two,  pious,  economical,  of  irreproachable  morals,  but  of  a 
feeble  intellect,  which  after  1769  at  several  times  and  dur- 
ing long  years  was  clouded,  showed,  contrary  to  his  two 
predecessors,  a  marked  and  constant  preference  for  the 
Tories.  Pitt  wished  both  the  greatness  and  the  liberty  of 
England.  He  was  unable  to  yield  to  the  preferences  of  the 
king,  and  quitted  the  ministry  in  1761  in  consequence  of  a 
parliamentary  check  which  Lord  Bute  inflicted  upon  him  on 
the  question  of  the  declaration  of  war  against  Spain.  This 
retirement  of  the  great  minister  did  not  arrest  the  successes 
of  England.  To  Pitt  in  reality  is  due  the  honor  of  having 
imposed  on  France  the  treaty  of  Paris,  which  carried  so  high 
the  colonial  power  of  England,  and  which,  nevertheless,  he 
reproached  the  ministers  for  having  signed,  thinking  that 
France  had  not  been  brought  sufficiently  low. 

It  is  now  fitting  to  trace  the  picture  of  England's  prodi- 
gious colonial  empire. 

England,   despite    her   insular  position,   had    not   been 

originally  a  maritime  and  colonial  power.     Under  Henry 

VII.    the   Venetian  Gabotto  (Cabot)  in  the 

The      English  .  •    V    '  i 

East  India  Com-  service  of  that  prince  coasted  along  the  north 
pany'  of  America,  without,  however,  founding  there 

any  establishment.  The  navy  was  developed  under  Eliza- 
beth by  Drake,  Hawkins,  Frobisher,  and  Cavendish.  But 
only  at  the  beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century  did  the 
colonizing  spirit  show  itself  in  England,  when  troubles  drove 
from  the  mother  country  a  great  number  of  her  children. 
In  the  middle  of  that  century  the  Navigation  Act  forced 
England  to  become  a  great  mercantile  power ;  at  its  end 


44°  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

the  decline  of  Holland  and  the  ruin  of  the  French  marine 
gave  to  England  the  empire  of  the  seas. 

The  English  had  thought  first  of  the  East  Indies.  In 
1600  the  East  India  Company  was  founded.  Its  capital 
was  70,000  pounds  sterling  in  ten-pound  shares.*  It  estab- 
lished a  few  factories  at  Bantam  in  the  island  of  Java,  at 
Surat  on  the  Gulf  of  Cambay,  and  at  Madras  on  the  coast 
of  Coromandel.  The  Dutch,  then  absolute  masters  of  the 
seas,  drove  the  English  from  these  feeble  positions,  and  the 
company  was  near  dissolution.  It  kept  alive,  however, 
obtained  from  the  Grand  Mogul  in  1650  the  right  of  traffick- 
ing in  Bengal,  and  acquired  in  1688  from  the  Crown  the 
island  of  Bombay,  which  Charles  II.  had  received  as  the 
dower  of  his  wife,  Catherine  of  Portugal.  In  1683  a  new 
catastrophe:  the  Dutch  deprived  it  of  Bantam,  and  the  acts 
of  brigandage  committed  by  John  Child  in  Hindustan  pro- 
voked reprisals  from  the  Grand  Mogul,  Aurangzeb.  The 
colony  of  Bombay  was  in  danger;  fortunately  for  it  the 
Indian  despot  pardoned  the  guilty  (1689). 

Escaped  from  this  peril,  the  company  obtained  some 
lands  on  the  banks  of  the  Hooghly,  one  of  the  arms  of  the 
Ganges,  and  there  founded  Calcutta  (1690) ;  it  had  acquired 
a  few  years  previously  Bencoulen  in  the  island  of  Sumatra, 
but  it  had  experienced  enormous  losses  in  the  war  of  the 
League  of  Augsburg:  it  was  estimated  that  the  French  then 
inflicted  upon  the  commerce  of  Great  Britain  losses  to  the 
amount  of  675,000,000  francs,  or  27,000,000  pounds  sterling. 
A  new  company  which  was  formed  was  another  obstacle.! 
In  the  end,  better  understanding  their  interests,  the  two 
companies  ceased  making  on  each  other  a  ruinous  war. 
They  united  their  funds  in  1702  ;  the  fusion  was  completed 
seven  years  after  by  the  establishment  of  a  central  single 
administration  for  the  direction  of  affairs.  Thus  was  defi- 
nitely accomplished  that  association  of  merchants  which 
equipped  fleets,  maintained  armies,  possessed  an  immense 


*  Twelve  years  later  its  capital  was  raised  to  400,000  pounds,  and 
voyages  were  then  undertaken  on  joint  stock  account. — ED. 

f  The  new  company — General  Society  trading  to  the  East  Indies — had 
powerful  patrons  and  a  capital  of  2,000,000  pounds.  Evelyn's  diary  of 
March  5,  1698,  states  :  "The  old  East  India  Company  lost  their  business 
against  the  new  company  by  ten  votes  in  parliament,  so  many  of  their 
friends  being  absent,  going  to  see  a  tiger  baited  by  dogs." — ED. 


CHAP.  XXVI.]  POWER  OF  ENGLAND.  44* 

territory,  governed  innumerable  peoples,  and  had  kings  as 
tributaries.* 

But  before  reaching  such  a  condition  it  had  many 
struggles  to  sustain.  The  war  of  the  Spanish  succession 
was  fatal  to  its  commerce:  the  French  privateers  continued 
against  it  the  system  that  had  so  well  succeeded  during  pre- 
ceding hostilities.  The  death  of  Aurangzeb  (1707)  came  at 
a  fortunate  time ;  the  anarchy  which  followed  his  death,  and 
the  rivalries  of  the  Indian  princes,  permitted  it  to  extend 
and  grow  rich. 

One  power  then  eclipsed  England  in  the  Indies,  and  that 
power  was  France.  During  the  reign  of  Francis  I.  mer- 
chants of  Rouen  had  hazarded  an  expedition  which  went 
no  farther  than  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope.  After  the  reli- 
gious wars  an  East  India  company  under  Henry  IV.  was 
established  in  Brittany ;  Richelieu  founded  a  second,  Col- 
bert a  third  in  1664.  The  latter,  more  successful,  which 
means  better  conducted,  than  the  others,  planted  a  first 
factory  at  Surat  in  1675,  and  then  another  in  1676  at 
Chandernagor,  which  twelve  years  after  it  bought  from 
Aurangzeb.  Pondicherry,  the  most  important  point  it  occu- 
pied, was  acquired  from  the  King  of  Beidjapour  in  1679. 
The  Dutch  with  reluctance  saw  the  French  in  those  regions. 
They  made  themselves  masters  of  the  place  in  1693  and 
fortified  it,  but  for  their  enemies:  the  treaty  of  Ryswick 
restored  Pondicherry  to  France.  This  splendid  establish- 
ment, which,  however,  lacked  a  large  harbor,  could  have 
become  the  center  of  a  vast  dominion.  Unfortunately  the 
company  was  abandoned;  its  ruin  was  hastened  by  the  pro- 
hibition against  importing  into  France  the  manufactured 
products  of  India.  The  war  of  the  Spanish  succession 
increased  its  distress ;  the  peace  of  Utrecht  did  not  concern 
itself  with  India,  where  the  English  and  French  interests 
had  not  yet  reached  a  development  bordering  on  antagonism. 
Then  appeared  the  famous  Law  with  his  projects,  chimerical 
because  so  gigantic.  He  united  the  companies  of  the  West, 
of  China,  of  Africa,  and  of  the  East  Indies  in  a  single  body 
under  the  name  of  Perpetual  Company  of  the  Indies  (1719). 
The  Perpetual  Company  fell  two  years  after  with  the  system, 

*  In  1709  the  company  was  able  to  loan  the  government  3,190,000 
pounds  at  2/4  per  cent.  The  profits  of  the  early  voyages  were  seldom 
less  than  100  per  cent. — ED. 


442  THE   EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

but  it  revived  in  1723  and  reached  a  new  prosperity.  Pon- 
dicherry  found  in  Dumas,  sent  as  governor  general  in  1725, 
a  skillful  and  active  man,  who  obtained  from  Mohammed 
Schad,  the  Grand  Mogul,  the  right  of  coining  money ;  and 
for  an  insignificant  sum  bought  the  city  and  territory  of 
Karikal  (1730)  from  an  Indian  pretender  to  the  kingdom 
of  Tanjaour. 

The  French  company  then  grew  with  rapidity;  it  pos- 
sessed factories  at  Calassor  in  Orissa,  at  Chandernagor,  at 
Dakka  in  Bengal,  at  Calicut,  at  Mahe,  and  at  Surat.  The 
empire  of  the  Mogul  was  divided  into  nine  great  provinces, 
governed  by  soubabs  or  viceroys;  these  provinces  in  their 
turn  were  subdivided  into  districts  administered  by  nabobs. 
After  the  death  of  Aurangzeb  all  these  princes  became,  or 
sought  to  become,  independent.  The  French  company  like 
the  English  took  advantage  of  these  rivalries  to  strengthen 
its  establishments;  it  intrusted  with  the  care  of  its  interests 
in  those  remote  regions  two  remarkable  men,  La  Bourdon- 
nais,  governor  general  of  the  islands  of  France  and  of  Bour- 
bon, whose  resources  he  developed,  and  Dupleix.  The  latter, 
appointed  in  1742  governor  of  Pondicherry  and  director 
general  of  the  French  factories  in  India,  formed  the  project, 
which  the  English  have  since  carried  out,  of  making  a  terri- 
torial power  of  the  company,  which  till  then  had  been  only 
commercial. 

When  the  war  of  the  Austrian  succession  broke  out,  the 
hostilities,  despite  the  propositions  of  the  cabinet  of  Ver- 
sailles and  after  the  refusal  of  the  cabinet  of  St.  James,  had 
the  colonies  as  their  theater.  La  Bourdonnais  quitted  the 
islands  of  France  and  Bourbon  to  operate  on  the  coasts  of 
the  Indian  continent  in  concert  with  Dupleix.  Unhappily 
jealousy  arose  between  these  two  superior  men,  discord 
paralyzed  their  strength  and  rendered  their  exploits  fruit- 
less. Thus  La  Bourdonnais,  victorious  over  an  English 
squadron,  besieged  Madras,  which  offered  a  ransom  of 
10,000,000  francs.  Dupleix  arrived,  annulled  the  capitula- 
tion, pillaged  the  city,  gave  it  up  to  the  flames,  and  even 
had  his  rival  removed  from  his  command  at  the  island  of 
France.  La  Bourdonnais  on  return  to  France  found  pub- 
lic opinion  prejudiced  by  the  accusations  of  Dupleix;  he 
was  confined  in  the  Bastille  and  remained  there  several 
years  without  the  opportunity  of  being  heard  in  his  defense. 
Meanwhile  the  English  returned  to  Madras  and  besieged 


CHAP.  XXVI.]  POWER  OF  ENGLAXD.  443 

Pondicherry;  Dupleix  by  an  admirable  resistance  forced 
them  to  retire.  Some  time  after  the  peace  of  Aix-la-Chapelle 
terminated  hostilities  (1748). 

Delivered  from  the  war  with  the  English,  Dupleix  resumed 
his  projects  of  conquest.  He  secured  the  triumph  of  a  pre- 
tender as  Soubab  of  the  Deccan,  and  obtained  from  him 
Mazulipatam  and  increase  of  territory  around  Pondicherry 
and  Karikal.  Then  he  ruled  from  the  river  Kristna  to  Cape 
Comorin  and  governed  30,000,000  men  with  absolute  power. 
Opposed  by  Lawrence  and  Clive,  English  officers,  who  were 
supported  by  good  troops  as  well  as  by  the  Mahrattas  and 
the  princes  of  Tanjaour  and  Mysore,  he  could  not  obtain 
the  success  of  his  candidate  as  Nabob  of  Carnat.  These 
expeditions  cost  much ;  the  merchants,  of  whom  Dupleix 
was  the  agent,  did  not  ask  glory  and  conquests,  but  divi- 
dends; abandoned  by  the  government  of  Louis  XV.,  which 
should  have  recognized  the  value  of  such  a  man,  he  was 
recalled  (1754).  Weeping  he  quitted  that  land  of  India 
where  he  had  given  France  a  coast  line  200  leagues  long  by 
from  25  to  30  broad  with  a  revenue  of  14,000,000  francs, 
and  had  established  French  influence  over  an  empire  five  or 
six  times  more  vast.  In  1763  he  died  at  Paris  in  misery. 
The  English  have  said  of  him  that,  had  he  been  sustained 
by  his  government,  India  would  have  belonged  to  France. 
By  practicing  his  policy  they  have  achieved  the  conquest  of 
that  wonderful  empire;  their  native  army,  which  a  few  years 
ago  brought  them  into  serious  peril  after  having  rendered  so 
signal  services,  is  only  a  copy  of  that  which  Dupleix  had 
organized;  the  position  to  which  they  have  reduced  the 
Indian  princes  is  the  same  which  he  began  to  impose  upon 
them. 

England  did  not  lose  time  in  taking  possession  of  this  fair 
heritage  to  which  France  put  forth  no  claim  of  inheritance. 
Her  flag  so  far  covered  only  a  small  number  of  forts;  a 
prince  of  Bengal  in  1756  even  seized  from  her  Calcutta, 
which  Clive  retook.  At  that  moment  broke  out  in  Europe 
the  Seven  Years'  War.  The  two  companies,  English  and 
French,  agreed  upon  neutrality;  this  was  violated  by  the 
English,  who  destroyed  Chandernagor  (1757)  because 
Suradja  Dowlah,  Nabob  of  Bengal,  wished  alliance  with 
the  French.  By  the  victory  of  Plassey  (1757)  Clive  over- 
threw that  prince  and  replaced  him  by  another  chief,  who 
ruled  in  the  interest  of  the  English.  This  one  success  was 


444  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

worth  seven  or  eight  million  francs  to  Clive  and  three 
times  as  much  to  the  company. 

The  Marquis  of  Bussey,  former  lieutenant  of  Dupleix, 
still  upheld  the  French  influence.  He  was  replaced  by 
Count  Lally,  an  Irishman  in  the  service  of  France.  He  was 
an  officer  of  talent  and  a  man  of  great  courage;  he  had  an 
Irish  hatred  for  the  English;  but  he  was  hot-headed  and 
violent  and  rendered  himself  odious  to  the  other  agents  of 
the  company,  far  more,  it  is  true,  by  his  integrity  than  by 
his  vices.  He  had  imagined  that  Arcot  was  still  the  land  of 
wealth,  that  Pondicherry  was  provided  with  everything,  and 
that  he  would  have  a  perfect  support  from  the  company  and 
the  troops.  In  all  these  anticipations  he  was  deceived:  no 
money  in  the  cash  box,  few  munitions,  blacks  and  sepoys 
for  the  army,  private  individuals  wealthy  and  the  colony 
poor,  utter  absence  of  subordination.  This  deception  devel- 
oped in  him  ill  humor,  which  is  unworthy  of  a  leader  and 
always  injurious  to  business.  However,  he  speedily  seized 
Gondelour,  but  failed  before  Madras  (1750).  After  having 
for  a  long  time  defended  Pondicherry  he  was  obliged  to 
capitulate  and  the  city  found  itself  in  ruins  (1761).  Return- 
ing to  France,  Lally  was  accused  of  treason  and  shamefully 
put  to  death;  gagged  to  prevent  his  speaking  to  the  people, 
he  was  carried  to  execution  in  a  tumbril  (1766).  At  the 
solicitation  of  his  son,  Lally-Tollendal,  this  sentence  was  in 
1778  declared  unjust.  The  French  colonies  in  East  India 
were  lost.  By  the  peace  of  1763  Pondicherry,  Karikal,  and 
Chandernagor  were  restored  to  France,  but  stripped  of  their 
territory  and  fortifications.  Lord  Clive  was  almost  as 
unfortunate  as  Lally.  Sent  in  1764  to  Hindustan  with  full 
powers,  he  forced  the  Grand  Mogul  to  abandon  to  the 
company  the  collection  of  the  revenues  of  Bohar,  Bengal, 
and  Orissa,  minus  an  annual  tribute  of  7,500,000  francs. 
But  afterward  accused  in  the  House  of  Commons  of  pecu- 
lation, although  the  report  of  the  commission  of  inquiry 
when  speaking  of  his  faults  had  also  spoken  of  his  services, 
he  was  unwilling  to  survive  what  he  regarded  as  an  injustice, 
and  so  committed  suicide  (1774). 

The  English  no  longer  had  European  rivals  in  India. 
Then  they  were  forced  to  fight  against  the  famous  Haidar 
AH,  sovereign  of  Mysore ;  they  concluded  a  disadvantageous 
treaty  with  him  in  1769,  but  four  years  later  completed  the 
conquest  of -Bengal.  The  company  was  nevertheless  near 


CHAP.  XXVI.]  POWER  OF  ENGLAND.  445 

bankruptcy  ;  the  government  came  to  its  assistance  on  con- 
dition that  it  should  enjoy  the  right  of  exercising  a  rigorous 
inspection  of  its  political  affairs.  Driven  from  Bengal, 
Haidar  AH  united  the  Mahrattas  and  the  Nizam  of  Deccan 
against  the  English.  This  coalition,  formed  at  the  moment 
when  war  had  broken  out  in  America,  seemed  to  put  the 
English  in  peril  (1778),  especially  as  France  had  granted 
her  alliance  to  the  American  colonies;  but  France  no 
longer  had  important  forces  in  India,  and  she  speedily  lost 
Chandernagor,  Karikal,  and  Pondicherry.  Two  victories 
of  Haidar  Ali  were  useless  (1780);  he  was  forced  into  retire- 
ment (1781)  after  a  great  defeat.  France  then  sent  to  his 
assistance  the  famous  Bailli  de  Suffren,  one  of  her  best 
admirals,  who  beat  the  English  as  many  times  as  he  met 
them.  But  Haidar  Ali  died  the  same  year  (1782).  He  left 
a  worthy  successor  in  his  son,  Tippoo  Sahib,  who  was  called 
the  Frederick  II.  of  the  East;  he  was  at  least  the  energetic 
representative  of  Indian  nationality  and  one  of  the  most 
remarkable  men  of  modern  Asia.  Tippoo  Sahib  continued 
the  war;  but  he  lost  the  French  alliance  when  the  treaty  of 
Versailles,  reconciling  England  and  France,  restored  Pon- 
dicherry, Karikal,  and  Chandernagor  to  the  latter  poAver, 
and  to  Holland  its  former  possessions  with  the  exception 
of  Negapatam  (1783).  He  then  signed  the  treaty  of  Man- 
galore  (1784). 

Tippoo  Sahib  recommenced  the  war  in  1792  and  sus- 
tained it  seven  years  with  success;  he  perished  while 
defending  his  capital,  Seringapatam  (1799).  Since  that 
moment  the  English  have  been  the  real  rulers  of  India; 
they  still  possess  that  vast  and  opulent  country  where 
they  have  150,000,000  subjects,  whom  their  first  governors 
oppressed  with  pitiless  cruelty.  A  successor  of  Lord  Clive, 
Warren  Hastings,  the  modern  Verres,  by  his  exactions 
occasioned  a  famous  trial  with  which  England  resounded 
seven  years  (1788-95). 


CHAPTER  XXVII. 
FOUNDATION  OF   THE    UNITED   STATES    OF    AMERICA. 


Origin  and  Constitution  of  the  English  Colonies  in  America. — American 
War  (1775-83). 


THE  English  had  not  counted  upon  Hindustan,  and  Hin- 
dustan is  to  them  a  mine  abounding  in  wealth. 

They  had  counted  upon  colonies  in  truth  less  opulent,  but 

less   remote.     To-day  those   colonies  are   free,  they  have 

Origin      and     grown  rich,  but  for  themselves,  they  constitute 

constitution  of    an  important  power,  and  vie  with  their  mother 

c  oei  o  n  i  e°sg  lf n     country  for  commercial  and  maritime  superi- 

America.  ority. 

In  the  sixteenth  century  the  English  made  many  voyages 
of  discovery  along  the  coast  of  North  America,  and  some 
few  attempts  at  colonization,  especially  under  Walter 
Raleigh  in  the  province  which  he  named  Virginia  in  honor 
of  Queen  Elizabeth.  He  expected  to  find  gold  and  silver 
mines  on  this  coast  as  in  Mexico.  In  1606  two  companies, 
the  London  Company  and  the  Plymouth  Company,  were 
formed  to  work  them.  James  I.  divided  between  them  the 
territory  situated  between  34°  and  48°  north  latitude.  The 
former  had  Virginia,  where  it  founded  Jamestown ;  the  lat- 
ter, New  England.  No  precious  metals  were  discovered; 
but  the  whale  fishery  on  the  coasts  of  Greenland  and  the 
cod  fishery  near  Newfoundland  accustomed  English  vessels 
to  frequenting  those  shores;  and  colonists  were  attracted  by 
the  rich  lands  of  Virginia,  where  tobacco  culture  rapidly 
assumed  importance.  The  intolerance  of  the  home  govern- 
ment soon  forced  others  to  the  lands  of  the  northern  com- 
pany. 

In  1620  Puritans,  escaping  from  old  England,  where  they 
were  persecuted  by  James  I.,  sought  beyond  the  ocean  a 
place  where  in  their  own  way  they  could  worship  God;  they 
established  themselves  at  the  foot  of  Cape  Cod,  not  many 

446 


CHAP.  XXVII.]    FOUNDATION  OF  UNITED  STATES.      447 

miles  from  the  spot  where  Boston  was  to  rise  a  few  years 
later.  At  the  same  time  the  Bermudas  and  a  part  of  the 
Antilles  were  occupied;  in  1629  the  colony  of  Massachu- 
setts Bay  was  organized;  then  came  those  of  New  Hamp- 
shire and  Maine  (1630),  united  to  Massachusetts  in  1691,  of 
Maryland,  ceded  in  1632  to  an  Irishman,  Lord  Baltimore, 
who  settled  there  200  Catholic  gentlemen,  of  Connecticut, 
(1635),  and  of  Rhode  Island  (1636).  Under  Cromwell  the 
English  captured  Jamaica  from  the  Spaniards,  and  a  little 
later  they  took  from  the  Dutch  the  New  Netherlands,  of 
which  they  made  three  provinces,  New  York,  New  Jersey, 
and  Delaware. 

Charles  II.  through  policy  encouraged  the  movement  of 
emigration  which  his  father  had  provoked  by  persecutions. 
He  gave  Carolina,  which  was  afterward  divided  into  two 
provinces,  to  eight  English  lords,  and  made  a  like  donation 
to  William  Penn,  who  called  the  country  where  he  settled 
Pennsylvania  (1682).  By  the  treaty  of  Utrecht  England 
acquired  Acadia,  or  Nova  Scotia,  Newfoundland,  and  Hud- 
son's Bay  (1713).  Georgia  was  not  occupied  before  1733. 

All  these  colonies,  founded  at  the  expense  of  private  per- 
sons and  not  held  in  leading  strings  by  the  home  govern- 
ment as  were  those  of  France,  developed  rapidly.  The 
English  colonists, who  numbered  only  40,000  in  1630,  formed 
in  1660  a  population  of  200,000  souls.  Canada,  colonized 
much  earlier,  had  meanwhile  only  attained  a  population  of 
eleven  or  twelve  thousand.  The  reason  is  that  the  English 
colonies  were  the  cradle  wherein  civil,  commercial,  and  re- 
ligious liberty  was  found,  while  monopoly  and  the  most  strict 
dependence  arrested  all  progress  in  Canada.  They  were 
open  to  all  comers,  and  there  was  no  conquered  party  in  the 
home  revolutions  which  did  not  find  in  America  an  asylum 
all  ready  to  receive  it :  New  England,  whose  code  was  called 
the  body  of  liberties,  for  the  "Roundheads"  and  repub- 
licans; Virginia  for  the  Cavaliers;  Maryland  for  the 
Catholics. 

There  were  three  kinds  of  government,  charter  govern- 
ments, royal  governments,  and  proprietary  governments. 
In  the  first  (Massachusetts,  Connecticut,  and  Rhode  Island) 
the  colonists  by  their  agents  or  representatives  exercised 
legislative,  executive,  and  judicial  functions.  In  the  second 
(Virginia,  New  York,  the  Carolinas,  Georgia,  New  Hamp- 
shire, and  New  Jersey)  the  governor  and  all  the  function- 


448  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

aries  were  named  by  the  king,  but  the  legislative  assemblies 
were  elective.  In  the  third  (Maryland,  Delaware,  Pennsyl- 
vania) the  proprietors  had  the  legislative  and  executive 
power.  There  also,  however,  existed  legislative  assemblies, 
named  partly  by  the  proprietors,  partly  by  the  people. 
Hence,  developed  or  limited,  the  representative  system 
existed  everywhere  in  the  English  colonies,  while  the 
French  of  Canada  had  been  unable  to  obtain  the  right  to 
appoint  a  syndic  or  mayor  at  Quebec,  "it  not  being  good," 
wrote  Colbert,  "that  one  should  speak  for  all."  Printing, 
which  was  introduced  into  the  French  colony  only  in  1764 
after  France  had  lost  it,  existed  in  1636  in  Massachusetts; 
a  law  of  that  province  required  under  penalty  of  fine  that 
there  should  be  a  primary  school  for  each  community  of  50 
hearths  and  a  grammar  school  in  each  village  of  100.  A 
college  for  the  higher  studies  was  founded  in  1636  in  order 
that,  said  they,  the  learning  of  their  fathers  should  not  be 
buried  with  them  in  their  tombs.* 

The  colonies  had  at  first  full  commercial  liberty.  This 
was  withdrawn  by  Cromwell.  Still  they  never  conformed 
save  imperfectly  to  restrictive  laws.  Especially  was  this  true 
of  Massachusetts,  the  most  flourishing  of  all,  which  replied 
to  the  representatives  of  Charles  II. :  "The  king  can  enlarge 
our  liberties,  but  has  no  authority  to  diminish  them."  At 
that  moment  the  Stuarts  were  making  most  earnest  efforts 
to  build  up  absolute  power;  they  established  it  in  the  colo- 
nies. Massachusetts  lost  her  charter;  it  was  restored  by 
the  revolution  of  1688. 

In  1739  the  idea  of  taxing  the  colonies  was  suggested  to 
Walpole.  "I  have  already  against  me,"  he  replied,  "all  old 
England;  do  they  wish  me  to  make  young  England  also  my 
enemy?" 

But  the  Seven  Years'  War,  politically  so  favorable  to 
England,  had  raised  its  debt  to  100,000,000  pounds,  on  which 
there  was  an  annual  interest  of  2,720,000  pounds.  After 
the  Seven  Years'  War  under  the  ministry  of  Lord  Grenville, 
father-in-law  of  the  younger  Pitt,  Parliament  imposed  upon 
the  American  colonies  the  stamp  tax,  which  compelled  them 

*  Before  the  revolution  eight  colleges  had  been  founded,  all  still 
existing,  widely  known,  and  influential.  These  are  Harvard,  founded 
1636  ;  William  and  Mary,  1693  ;  Yale,  1701  ;  Princeton,  1746  ;  King's 
(now  Columbia),  1754  ;  Brown,  1764  ;  Queen's  (now  Rutgers),  1766  ; 
Dartmouth,  1769. — ED. 


CHAP.  XXVII.J   FOUNDATION  OF  UNITED  STATES.      449 

to  employ  for  documents  a  paper  stamped  at  London  and 
sold  at  a  high  price  (1765).  The  opposition*  which  this 
impost  excited  compelled  its  revocation  by  the  ministry  the 
following  year.  It  was  replaced  by  a  tax  on  glass,  paper, 
and  tea  (1767). 

The  colonists,  invoking  the  grand  principle  of  the  Eng- 
lish constitution  that  no  citizen  is  bound  to  submit  to  taxes 
not  voted  by  his  representatives,  refused  to  pay  these  duties, 
and  ninety-six  towns  formed  a  convention  at  Boston,  whose 
members  agreed  to  buy  no  English  merchandise  as  long  as 
justice  was  not  done  to  their  complaints.  In  the  one 
year  1769  the  English  exportations  to  America  diminished 
more  than  600,000  pounds.  Lord  North,  Prime  Minister 
of  England,  seeing  commerce  decrease,  proposed  the  repeal 
of  the  new  duties  except  that  on  tea.  This  half  concession 
satisfied  nobody.  The  inhabitants  of  Boston  threw  into  the 
sea  three  cargoes  of  tea  which  had  arrived  from  England, 
and  the  minister  closed  the  port  of  Boston  by  act  of  Parlia- 
ment (1774).  A  general  congress  of  the  colonies  met  at 
Philadelphia.  It  addressed  an  ineffectual  remonstrance  to 
the  king;  and,  as  William  Pitt,  who  wished  both  the  liberty 
of  the  Americans  and  the  integrity  of  the  British  empire, 
had  foreseen,  war  broke  out. 

Upon  the  American  continent  war  was  carried  on  at  three 
points:  at  the  northeast  in  the  vicinity  of  the  important 
cities  of  Boston,  New  York,  and  Philadelphia; 
war  c^775-83).an  in  the  northwest  toward  Canada,  which  the 
Americans  endeavored  to  draw  into  their 
movement,  and  whence  the  English  were  able  to  attack  in 
the  rear  the  colonists,  whom  they  menaced  in  front  from  the 
ocean;  lastly  in  the  south  around  Charleston  in  South 
Carolina,  where  the  English  with  their  fleet  had  every 
advantage  for  carrying  on  the  war.  Therefore  the  Americans 
were  obliged  to  divide  their  forces,  and  their  troops  had  to 
march  enormous  distances.  When  France  took  part  in  the 
war  it  extended  over  all  the  seas. 

The  opening  of  hostilities  was  marked  by  a  success  which 
strengthened  the  heart  of  the  insurgents:  the  American 
militia  at  Lexington  defeated  an  English  detachment  (1775) 
and  30,000  Americans  besieged  General  Gage  in  Boston. 

*  The  first  colonial  congress,  consisting  of  twenty-eight  delegates  from 
nine  States,  met  October  7,  1765,  at  New  York,  and  there  issued  the 
famous  Declaration  of  Rights. — ED. 


45°  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

It  was  a  multitude,  but  not  an  army.  To  organize  it  con- 
gress appointed  as  generalissimo  George  Washington,  a  rich 
Virginian  planter,  who  as  a  colonial  officer  had  distinguished 
himself  in  the  Seven  Years'  War  against  the  French.  While 
he  introduced  discipline  and  sustained  military  order,  the 
western  colonists  invaded  Canada  and  captured  Montreal, 
but  their  leader,  Montgomery,  was  killed  at  the  siege  of 
Quebec.  Carleton  repulsed  them  from  that  city  and  drove 
them  from  the  province.  The  capture  of  Boston  by  Wash- 
ington (March  17,  1776)  was  inadequate  compensation. 

However,  congress  dared  to  break  irrevocably  with  Great 
Britain  by  declaring  the  independence  of  the  thirteen  colo- 
nies (July  4,  1776),  who  formed  themselves  into  a  confeder- 
ation, in  which,  however,  each  State  preserved  its  religious 
and  political  liberty.  In  this  declaration  were  to  be  remarked 
the  following  principles  which  seemed  to  issue  from  the 
heart  of  French  philosophy  :*  "All  men  are  created  equal ; 
they  are  endowed  by  their  creator  with  certain  inalienable 
rights;  to  secure  these  rights  governments  are  instituted 
among  men  deriving  their  just  powers  from  the  consent  of 
the  governed;  whenever  any  form  of  government  becomes 
destructive  of  these  ends,"  for  which  it  has  been  established, 
"  it  is  the  right  of  the  people  to  alter  or  abolish  it." 

The  English  ministry  had  bought  of  the  German  princes 
17,000  mercenaries.  The  American  volunteers,  without 
magazines,  without  resources,  could  not  at  first  hold  their 
own  against  the  veteran  regiments,  well  supplied  and  well 
paid,  which  were  directed  against  them.  Howe  captured 
New  York  and  Rhode  Island,  and  inflicted  upon  Washing- 
ton near  the  River  Brandywine  a  check  which  exposed 
Philadelphia.  Discouragement  crept  into  Washington's 

*  The  immense  share  of  the  French  in  inspiring  and  achieving  the 
independence  of  the  colonies  is  very  inadequately  set  forth  in  most 
American  accounts  of  the  Revolutionary  War.  It  is  well  known  that 
some  of  the  opening  sentences  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence  are 
taken  almost  verbatim  from  the  "  Contrat  Social  "  of  Jean  Jacques  Rous- 
seau, and  that  ideas  developed  by  French  philosophy  were  the  inspiration 
of  the  writer  of  that  Declaration,  Thomas  Jefferson.  It  is  indeed  too 
much  to  assert,  as  is  often  done,  that  resistance  to  British  oppression  was 
the  achievement  pre-eminently  of  any  one  section  or  the  result  of  any 
'one  school  of  politics.  But  the  vast  debt  which  Americans  owe  to  the 
ideas  of  French  thinkers  and  to  the  material  assistance  of  France  through 
what  otherwise  might  have  been  a  hopeless  struggle  ought  never  to  be 
forgotten  by  an  honorable  and  grateful  people. — ED. 


CHAP.  XXVII.]   FOUNDATION  OF  UNITED  STATES.      45 1 

army.  The  royalists,  the  few  partisans  whom  England 
retained,  commenced  to  act  and  several  States  wavered  in 
their  new  allegiance  to  America.  Congress  withdrew  to 
Baltimore  in  Maryland,  abandoning  Philadelphia,  which 
Howe  entered  (September  n).  But  the  American  general 
knew  even  in  the  midst  of  the  hardest  experiences  how  to 
preserve  the  judicious  audacity  which  such  a  war  demanded. 
He  resumed  the  offensive  at  Germantown  (October  10),  and 
if  he  was  not  a  conqueror,  he  at  least  escaped  defeat.  This 
persistency  saved  his  country,  for  thus  retaining  Howe  in 
the  vicinity  of  Chesapeake  Bay  he  hindered  him  from  unit- 
ing with  Burgoyne,  who  was  marching  with  a  splendid  army 
from  Canada.  The  militia  of  the  west,  whom  Washington 
had  re-enforced  by  some  of  his  best  troops,  stopped  Burgoyne 
at  Saratoga  (September  19),  surrounded  his  army,  and 
obliged  him  (October  17)  to  lay  down  his  arms. 

France  had  hailed  with  enthusiasm  a  revolution  wherein 
she  recognized  herself.  She  received  the  American  pri- 
vateers in  her  harbors,  and  Holland  sold  them  munitions. 
To  determine  France  to  convert  this  indirect  assistance  into 
an  alliance  the  United  States  sent  a  deputation  to  Paris,  at  the 
head  of  which  was  the  illustrious  Franklin,  who  during  his 
stay  in  France  was  the  object  of  a  constant  ovation.  The 
young  nobility,  exalted  by  philosophic  ideas,  and  all  on  fire 
to  efface  the  shame  of  the  Seven  Years'  War  and  to  fight 
against  a  detested  rival,  wished  in  a  crowd  to  set  out  for 
America.  The  Marquis  de  la  Fayette,  aged  hardly  twenty, 
quitted  his  enceinte  wife,  and  himself  chartered  a  vessel 
which  he  loaded  with  arms.  But  the  government  dreaded 
a  rupture  with  Great  Britain.  Turgot  had  demanded  that 
France  remain  neutral,  well  foreseeing  that  England  would 
gain  more  by  acknowledging  the  independence  of  her  colonies 
than  by  holding  them  restive  under  the  yoke.  De  Ver- 
gennes,  in  accord  with  the  cabinet  of  Madrid,  was  satisfied 
at  first  by  sending  indirect  assistance;  he  secretly  advanced 
Beaumarchais  the  money  necessary  for  him  to  dispatch  to 
the  colonists  the  arms  and  munitions  which  they  lacked. 

The  defeat  of  Saratoga  decided  Louis  XVI.  to  yield  to 
the  solicitations  of  Franklin  and  of  his  ministers.  On 
February  6,  1778,  he  signed  with  the  United  States  a  com- 
mercial treaty,  fortified  by  an  alliance  offensive  and  defen- 
sive if  England  declared  war  against  France.  The  English 
ambassador  was  at  once  recalled. 


45 2  THE   EIGHTEENTH   CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

Lord  North  to  avert  the  peril  offered  the  colonies  by  a 
conciliatory  bill  more  than  they  had  asked  at  the  outset  of 
the  war.  It  was  too  late;  the  Americans  rejected  all  con- 
cessions which  did  not  include  the  recognition  of  their  inde- 
pendence; the  war  continued. 

France  fortunately  had  passed  through  the  hands  of 
Choiseul,  who  had  restored  her  navy.  A  fleet  of  twelve 
ships  and  four  frigates  under  Count  d'Estaing  set  out 
from  Toulon  for  America  (1778);  another  was  formed  at 
Brest  to  fight  in  European  waters;  finally,  an  army  was  got 
ready  to  make  a  descent  in  England.  The  victory  of  the 
frigate  La  Belle  Poule,  which  dismasted  an  English  frigate, 
gloriously  opened  hostilities.  Count  d'Orvilliers,  sailing 
out  of  Brest  with  thirty-two  vessels,  brought  the  indecisive 
battle  of  Ouessant  against  Admiral  Keppel  (July  27). 
England  was  appalled  at  seeing  France  reappear  upon  the 
sea  on  an  equal  footing  with  her,  and  summoned  the  admiral 
before  a  council  of  war.  Not  to  have  obtained  the  victory 
was  to  her  the  same  thing  as  defeat. 

In  America  Clinton,  threatened  with  being  surrounded 
in  Philadelphia  by  the  army  of  Washington  and  the  French 
fleet  of  d'Estaing,  retired  upon  New  York,  which  he  entered 
only  after  a  check  experienced  at  Monmouth. 

To  divide  the  forces  which  pursued  him  he  sent  Colonel 
Campbell  into  Georgia,  and  the  war  then  extended  to  the 
southern  colonies.  It  reached  the  Antilles;  the  Marquis  de 
Bouille  there  captured  Domenica,  but  the  English  seized  St. 
Lucia,  which  d'Estaing  could  not  retake.  In  India  France 
lost  Pondicherry. 

Then  were  reaped  the  fruits  of  the  policy  of  the  Duke  de 
Choiseul,  who  had  renewed  the  alliance  of  France  with  Spain. 
The  latter  power  offered  its  mediation,  which  England 
refused.  Persuaded  by  the  Count  de  Vergennes,  who 
pointed  out  Gibraltar,  Minorca,  and  the  Floridas  ripe  for 
reconquest,  she  declared  war  against  England  and  united 
her  fleet  to  that  of  France  (1779).  The  Count  d'Orvilliers 
with  sixty-six  ships  of  the  line  sailed  toward  Portsmouth; 
great  disaster  may  have  been  spared  England  by  a  tempest 
which  dispersed  his  fleet.  Having  gained  nothing  by  this 
great  armament  France  sought  consolation  in  the  capture 
of  Grenada,  which,  after  a  victory  over  Admiral  Byron,  was 
seized  by  d'Estaing,  who  was  the  first  man  to  leap  into  the 
enemy's  intrenchments. 


CHAP.  XXVII.]   FOUNDATION  OF  UNITED  STATES.      453 

This  event  resounded  prodigiously  in  Paris.  Admiral 
Rodney  was  then  there,  detained  for  debts  which  he  could 
not  pay.  One  day  while  dining  with  Marshal  de  Biron  he 
spoke  contemptuously  of  the  successes  won  by  the  French 
navy,  saying  if  he  were  free  he  would  soon  bring  it  to  rea- 
son. The  marshal  immediately  paid  his  debts.  "Depart, 
sir,"  he  said  to  him,  "endeavor  to  keep  your  promises. 
The  French  have  no  wish  to  win  through  means  of  obstacles 
which  prevent  your  fulfilling  them." 

This  chivalrous  generosity  cost  France  dear;  Rodney 
almost  kept  his  word.  He  beat  a  Spanish  fleet,  revictualed 
Gibraltar,  which  a  Franco-Spanish  army  was  besieging,  and 
in  the  Antilles  the  following  year  (1780)  fought  three  battles 
with  the  Count  de  Guichen.  But  the  count  rendered  the 
victory  uncertain  and  captured  on  his  return  to  Europe  an 
English  convoy  of  sixty  ships  with  a  booty  worth  50,000,000 
francs. 

The  year  1780  was  favorable  to  the  English  arms.  The 
diversion  attempted  by  Clinton  in  the  south  had  succeeded; 
Georgia  was  occupied.  This  success  emboldened  him  to 
attempt  another  enterprise.  He  saw  the  Americans,  already 
weary  of  the  war,  intrust  to  France  and  Spain  the  task  of 
their  salvation,  and  Washington  reduced  to  inactivity  by 
the  misery  of  his  army.  He  quitted  New  York  with  a  part 
of  his  forces,  captured  Charleston  in  South  Carolina,  where 
he  made  5000  prisoners,  and  there  left  Cornwallis,  who 
defeated  all  the  generals  charged  by  congress  with  the 
recovery  of  the  province. 

A  check  of  Count  d'Estaing  before  Savannah,  which  he 
wished  to  enter  before  the  breach  was  opened,  for  a  moment 
compromised  the  American  cause.  But  a  vast  coalition 
was  forming  against  the  maritime  despotism  of  England. 
To  hinder  France  and  Spain  from  receiving  from  the  north- 
ern states  the  naval  munitions  necessary  to  their  arsenals, 
the  English  arrested  and  searched  neutral  ships.  Hence 
arose  a  thousand  vexations  and  abuses  and  the  ruin  of  the 
trade  of  neutrals.  Catharine  II.  was  the  first  to  proclaim 
the  freedom  of  the  flag  (1780)  on  condition  that  it  did  not 
cover  contraband  of  war,  such  as  powder,  balls,  and  can- 
non; to  support  this  principle  she  proposed  a  scheme  of 
armed  neutrality  which  was  successively  accepted  by  Sweden 
and  Denmark,  Prussia  and  Austria,  Portugal,  the  Two 


454  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [BooK  VI. 

Sicilies,  and  Holland.*  England  forthwith  declared  war 
against  Holland,  the  weakest  and  most  vulnerable  of  the 
neutral  states.  Rodney  threw  himself  upon  St.  Eustatius, 
a  Dutch  colony,  where  he  made  the  seizure  of  more  than 
16,000,000  francs'  worth,  which  the  brave  Lamothe-Piquet 
retook  in  sight  of  the  English  shores. 

England  bowed  under  the  burden.  France  having  sent 
to  the  Americans  money  and  an  army  under  Rochambeau, 
the  allies  had  a  succession  of  victories  (1781).  The  Span- 
iards captured  Pensacola  in  Florida,  and  Count  de  Grasse 
laid  waste  the  English  Antilles.  "He  is  six  feet  tall,"  said 
the  French  sailors,  "and  six  feet  one  inch  on  the  day  of 
battle."  His  victories  contributed  to  those  which  Washing- 
ton, Rochambeau,  and  La  Fayette  gained  on  the  American 
continent.  On  October  n,  1781,  they  forced  General  Corn- 
wallis  to  capitulate  in  Yorktown  with  7000  men,  6  ships  of 
war,  and  50  merchant  vessels.  This  was  the  second  English 
army  which  had  been  made  prisoner  during  the  war.  This 
exploit  was  decisive  for  American  independence.  The 
English,  who  still  held  New  York,  Savannah,  and  Charles- 
ton, thereafter  acted  only  on  the  defensive.  At  the  same 
time  Marquis  de  Bouille  took  from  them  St.  Eustatius; 
the  Uuke  de  Crillon,  Minorca;  and  Suffren,  one  of  the  most 
illustrious  French  sailors,  who  had  been  sent  to  the  East 
Indies  to  protect  the  Dutch  colonies,  gained  there  four 
naval  victories  (February  and  September,  1782).  Already 
he  was  forming  with  Haidar  Ali,  Sultan  of  Mysore,  vast 
plans  for  the  destruction  of  the  English  domination  on  that 
continent  when  he  was  arrested  by  peace. 

In  the  Antilles  the  English  retained  no  other  important 
possession  than  Jamaica;  this  island  de  Grasse  endeavored 
to  sieze  in  1782,  but,  attacked  by  superior  forces  under 
Rodney,  he  was  defeated  and  captured;  on  his  ship  there 
were  only  three  men  unwounded.  That  battle  of  Les 
Saintes,  which  was  without  serious  results,  was  given  great 

*  The  league  proposed  to  defend  these  principles,  which  were  finally 
recognized  by  England  in  1854  in  the  treaty  of  Paris  :  The  neutral  flag 
covers  merchandise  except  contraband  of  war  which  might  serve  the 
enemy ;  neutral  vessels  can  go  anywhere  save  into  ports  blockaded  by 
an  effective  force ;  the  neutral,  unless  convoyed  by  a  vessel  of  war,  is 
liable  to  search,  but  the  ship  exercising  that  right  must  remain  a  cannon 
shot  distant  and  send  alongside  only  a  boat  with  three  men  on  board. — 
ED. 


CHAP.  XXVII.]   FOUNDA  TION  OF  UNITED  STA  TES.     455 

importance  in  public  opinion.  It  was  forgotten  that  this 
was  the  first  lost  in  that  war  by  the  French. 

The  skillful  defense  of  Gibraltar  against  the  combined 
forces  of  France  and  Spain  was  another  check.  That  siege 
had  excited  universal  expectation.  Count  d'Artois,  a 
brother  of  Louis  XVI.,  obtained  from  the  king  permission 
to  proceed  thither.  The  place  was  blockaded  by  20,000 
men  and  40  ships.  Two  hundred  pieces  of  ordnance  from 
the  land  side  and  ten  floating  batteries  opened  (September 
13)  a  tremendous  fire  against  the  rock,  which  was  defended 
by  its  formidable  position  and  by  the  courage  of  the  English 
governor,  Eliot.  The  fortress,  attacked  as  no  other  had 
ever  been,  soon  found  its  condition  hopeless.  It  had 
hurled  600  red-hot  balls  in  vain  against  the  floating  batteries, 
when  one  of  these  last  projectiles  pierced  unperceived  the 
weatherboards  of  the  Tailla  Perdra,  where  all  the  precau- 
tions enjoined  by  the  inventor  had  not  been  taken.  It 
made  its  way  silently,  reached  the  powder  and  blew  it  up. 
The  fire  gained  the  two  neighboring  batteries;  the  Spaniards 
under  the  pretext  of  preventing  the  English  from  capturing 
the  rest  set  them  on  fire.  In  this  siege  12,000  men  perished 
and  Gibraltar  remained  with  the  English. 

However,  England  had  lost  her  reputation  of  invincible 
upon  the  seas;  her  commerce  had  enormously  suffered; 
her  debt  had  increased  over  100,000,000  pounds  sterling. 
Lord  North,  leader  of  the  war  party,  resigned  from  the  min- 
istry and  was  replaced  by  the  Whigs,  who  made  proposals 
of  peace  to  the  cabinet  of  Versailles.  France,  for  her  part, 
had  spent  1,400,000,000  francs,  but  at  least  she  had 
obtained  a  grand  and  noble  result,  the  independence  of 
the  United  States.  Peace  was  signed  (September  3,  1783). 
It  was  honorable  for  France,  who  caused  the  shameful 
article  of  the  treaty  of  Utrecht  relative  to  Dunkirk  to  be 
erased;  it  obtained  for  Spain  Minorca;  for  France,  Chan- 
dernagor,  Pondicherry,  Karikal,  Mahe",  and  Surat  in  the 
Indies;  Tabago  and  St.  Lucia  in  the  Antilles;  the  islands 
of  St.  Pierre  and  Miquelon  with  the  right  of  fishery  on  the 
coasts  of  Newfoundland;  finally,  Gore"e  and  Senegal  in 
Africa.  This  war,  the  last  triumph  of  the  ancient  mon- 
archy, carried  with  it  a  lesson  :  that  lesson  is  that  France, 
when  seriously  resolved,  can  in  a  hand  to  hand  conflict  with 
England  dispute  the  empire,  or  at  least  secure  the  liberty, 
of  the  sea. 


45 6  THE  EIGHTEENTH   CENTURY. 

Peace  did  not  terminate  the  labors  of  Washington.  He 
had  to  appease  the  murmurs  of  his  soldiers,  who  believed 
themselves  forgotten  the  moment  they  were  no  longer  use- 
ful. Their  lot  regulated,  he  tendered  his  resignation;  a 
plain,  private  individual  on  the  banks  of  the  Potomac  in  the 
shade  of  his  vine  and  fig  tree,  he  lived  tranquil  in  his  man- 
sion of  Mount  Vernon  in  Virginia,  with  the  glory  of  having 
founded  the  independence  of  his  country  and  with  the  purest 
name  of  modern  times. 

By  the  freedom  of  the  United  States  England  lost  a 
large  part  of  her  American  colonies ;  but  she  retained  British 
North  America  and  the  Antilles;  she  had  possessions  in 
Africa,  many  forts  or  factories  on  the  Gambia,  the  colony 
of  Sierra  Leone,  Cape  Coast  on  the  Gold  Coast,  and  the 
island  of  St.  Helena;  she  opened  herself  a  new  world  in  the 
Pacific  Ocean,  where  at  Botany  Bay  she  established  a  con- 
vict station,  and  where  she  founded  Sidney  in  1788;  she 
continued  her  aggrandizement  in  the  Indies,  where  Tippoo 
Sahib  resisted  her  in  vain;  so  that  despite  her  defeats  she 
remained  the  foremost  maritime  and  commercial  power  of 
the  world. 


CHAPTER  XXVIII. 

DESTRUCTION   OF    POLAND.— DECLINE  OF    THE  OTTO- 
MANS.— GREATNESS   OF    RUSSIA. 


Russia  from  Peter  the  Great  to  Catherine  II. — Catherine  II.  (1762-96); 
First  Partition  of  Poland  (1772). — Treaties  of  Kainardji  (1774)  and 
Jassy  (1792). — Second  and  Third  Partitions  of  Poland  (1793  and  1795). 


WHILE  a  new  nation  was  being  born  on  the  other  side  of 

the  ocean  an  ancient  nation  in  aged  Europe  was  dying  in 

the  fatal  embrace  of  a  power  which  only   a 

Russia     from      £  u    r          u    j    *    i  •*.        i 

Peter  the  Great    few  years  before  had  taken    its  place  among 

to  Catherine  II.      the  great  stateg> 

The  real  successor  of  Peter  the  Great  was  Catherine 
II.  Let  us,  however,  indicate  the  line  of  Russian  princes. 
Catherine  I.,  wife  of  the  founder  of  the  empire,  ruled 
after  him  for  two  years,  under  the  guidance  of  Ment- 
schikoff,  who  continued  the  work  of  the  master  to  whom  he 
owed  all.  Under  Peter  II.,  son  of  the  unfortunate  Czare- 
vitch Alexis,  the  influence  of  the  minister  seemed  to  increase. 
But  a  young  favorite,  Ivan  Dolgorouki,  of  a  family  which 
claimed  to  descend  from  Rurik,  captivated  the  mind  of  the 
Czar,  and  the  veteran  minister  was  overthrown  and  exiled 
to  Siberia.  Peter  II.  having  died  prematurely  at  the  age  of 
fifteen  (1730),  the  Dolgoroukis  and  the  Galitzins  gave  the 
empire  to  Anne  of  Courland,  a  niece  of  Peter  the  Great, 
imposing  upon  her  conditions  which,  if  observed,  would  have 
destroyed  the  work  of  Peter  to  the  profit  of  the  aristocracy. 
This  was  the  first  attempt  made  by  the  nobility  to  reseize  the 
power;  the  second  was  the  great  conspiracy  of  1825,  but 
in  the  interval  the  nobles  butchered  three  emperors,  Ivan 
VI.,  Peter  III.,  and  Paul.  I. 

Anne  had  no  great  difficulty  in  freeing  herself  from  the 
restrictions  placed  upon  her  power.  The  Galitzins  were 
banished,  the  Dolgoroukis  sent  to  Siberia,  and  everything 
yielded  to  the  favorite  Biren,  son  of  a  peasant  of  Courland, 
who  put  to  death  with  torture  all  those  who  gave  him 
umbrage.  Siberia  even  did  not  protect  the  princes  Dol- 

457 


45 8  THE    EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [Boon  VI. 

gorouki  against  his  hate.  Four  of  them  were  quartered, 
others  beheaded;  12,000  of  their  partisans  died  painful 
deaths;  20,000  were  exiled.  In  1737  Anne  caused  her 
favorite  to  be  chosen  Duke  of  Courland,  despite  the  resist- 
ance of  the  nobility  of  that  province;  who  a  few  years  before 
had  declined  to  recognize  him  as  a  plain  gentleman.  This 
reign,  however,  did  not  lack  a  certain  splendor.  Anne,  fol- 
lowing the  example  of  Peter  the  Great,  surrounded  herself 
by  foreigners,  many  of  whom  showed  marked  talent.  Russia 
successfully  interfered  in  the  war  of  the  Polish  succession, 
and  caused  Augustus  III.  to  be  recognized  in  spite  of  the 
claims  of  Stanislaus  Leczinski,  the  choice  of  the  nation, 
whom  in  17343  Russian  army  besieged  in  Dantzic.  "Never," 
says  a  contemporary,  "during  this  war  did  300  Russians 
turn  aside  to  avoid  encountering  3000  Poles."  The  Porte, 
which  had  allowed  the  Poles  to  be  oppressed,  suffered  for 
its  mistake.  The  Irishman  Lascy  entered  Azof;  in  1736 
the  German  Munich  forced  the  defenses  of  Perecop  and 
traversed  the  Crimea  without  being  able  to  hold  it.  The 
following  year,  after  the  alliance  concluded  with  the  Aus- 
trians,  he  carried  by  assault  Otchakof,  the  rampart  of  the 
Ottoman  empire  on  the  Dnieper;  in  1739  he  took  Khotzim 
on  the  Dniester,  crossed  the  Pruth,  which  had  been  so  fatal 
to  Peter  the  Great  in  1711,  and  entered  Jassy.  He  wished 
to  go  farther  still,  to  cross  the  Danube,  the  Balkans.  He 
counted  upon  an  insurrection  of  the  Greeks;  he  did  not 
doubt  that  with  their  aid  he  could  seize  Constantinople. 
But  the  reverses  experienced  by  the  Austrians  in  the  loss  of 
Orsova  (1738)  and  the  defeat  of  Krotzka  near  Belgrade 
(1739)  obliged  the  Russians  at  the  peace  of  Belgrade  (1739) 
to  restore  all  these  conquests.  Munich  has  remained  cele- 
brated like  Suwarrow  for  a  sometimes  savage  energy.  In 
front  of  Otchakof  a  column  refused  to  advance,  appalled 
by  the  terrible  fire  of  the  enemy:  he  had  cannon  pointed 
against  it.  Seeing  that  the  soldiers  counterfeited  sickness  so 
as  to  remain  in  the  rear,  he  prohibited  sickness  in  his  army 
under  pain  of  being  buried  alive.  The  following  day  three 
soldiers  suffered  the  penalty  in  front  of  the  camp. 

Anne  had  designated  as  her  successor  her  nephew,  Ivan 
VI.,  who  was  still  in  the  cradle,  the  son  of  her  sister,  the 
Duchess  of  Brunswick.  Biren  was  to  be  regent.  The 
duchess  gained  over  Munich  and  after  a  month's  reign  Biren 
was  sent  to  Siberia.  The  national  vanity  was  irritated  at  see- 


CHAP.  XXVIII.]     DESTRUCTION  OF  POLAND.  459 

ing  foreigners  thus  dispose  of  the  crown  and  the  power. 
Elizabeth,  second  daughter  of  Peter  the  Great,  with  105 
grenadiers  from  the  Preobrai'enski  regiment  under  the  com- 
mand of  the  German  Lestocq,  went  to  the  palace,  took  pos- 
session of  it,  committed  the  duchess  to  prison  and  confined 
in  it  Ivan  VI.,  who  twenty  years  after  was  butchered  by  his 
keepers. 

A  terrible  reaction  broke  out  against  the  foreigners. 
Biren  was  recalled  from  Siberia,  but  Munich  took  his  place 
and  remained  there  twenty  years.  Many  others  had  a  simi- 
lar lot.  Some  few  more  fortunate  escaped,  such  as  Keith, 
Lascy,  Lowendall,  and  the  mathematician  Euler,  who  put 
their  talents  at  the  service  of  less  barbarous  governments. 
Besides,  there  was  only  a  change  of  men,  for  favoritism  con- 
tinued. In  place  of  the  German  Munich  there  was  the 
Russian  Bestucheff.  The  reign  of  Elizabeth  (1741-62) 
was  on  the  whole  disastrous.  At  home  she  allowed  the 
institutions  of  Peter  the  Great  to  perish.  She  abolished  the 
death  penalty,  but  replaced  it  by  deportation  to  Siberia, 
which  was  worse ;  though  heads  could  no  longer  be  made  to 
fall  as  under  Peter  the  Great,  yet  entire  peoples  could  be 
transported  to  that  icy  tomb,  where,  it  is  said,  she  exiled 
80,000  persons.  Abroad  she  conquered  Finland,  of  which 
the  English  mediation  prevented  her  retaining  more  than  a 
part  (1743);  for  frivolous  motives  she  made  against  Fred- 
erick II.  a  war  as  furious  as  it  was  impolitic.  Her  death 
saved  Prussia  from  almost  inevitable  ruin.  Peter  III.,  who 
succeeded  her,  was  son  of  a  duke  of  Holstein-Gottorp  and 
of  an  elder  daughter  of  Peter  the  Great.  He  was  the  great- 
great-grandfather  of  the  present  Czar.  Peter  III.  had  for 
the  Prussian  hero  an  admiration  as  unreasonable  as  had 
been  the  hate  of  Elizabeth.  He  declared  himself  the  ally 
of  Frederick  and  placed  the  Russian  troops  at  his  disposi- 
tion. But  this  incapable  prince  did  not  reign  long;  at  the 
very  time  when  he  was  about  to  punish  the  disorders  of  his 
wife  she  forestalled  him,  dethroned  and  strangled  him. 
She  took  the  name  of  Catherine  II. 

Three  peoples  were  an  obstacle  to  Russia,  barring  the 
west  against  her:  Poland,  Sweden,  and  Turkey.  Catherine 
II.  was  to  take  possession  of  the  first;  Alexander  I.  of  half 
of  the  second.  Nicholas  afterward  desired  to  absorb  the 
third  in  its  entirety,  and  only  at  this  last  attempt  did 
Europe  rise  to  arrest  the  Muscovite  ambition. 


460  THE   EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

How  could  this  people,  born  yesterday,  prevail  against  its 
glorious  neighbors?  Through  their  weakness  rather  than 
by  its  own  strength,  although  that  was  enormous. 

Sweden,  too  poor  by  herself  to  carry  on  war,  which  had 
become  so  costly,  too  scantily  populated  to  make  head  as 
formerly  with  her  small  armies  against  the  multitudes  which 
after  the  time  of  Louis  XIV.  it  became  the  fashion  to  put 
on  foot,  had  just  expended  with  Charles  XII.  her  last  sol- 
dier and  her  last  coin.  She  needed  time  and  repose  in 
order  to  restore  her  strength.  Meanwhile  Russia  purchased 
a  party  among  the  Swedes,  and  till  the  time  of  Gustavus  III. 
by  her  intrigues  and  her  gold  kept  Sweden  in  dependence. 

The  Ottomans  had  strong  frontiers  and  rich  provinces. 
But  they  had  lost  their  warrior  dash.  After  a  century  of 
furious  marches  and  victories  over  Europe  and  Asia  this 
people,  born  under  the  tent  and  ill  prepared  for  wealth  and 
domination,  had  fallen  back  into  Oriental  apathy,  whither  its 
religious  doctrine  of  fate  \vas  inevitably  to  lead;  after  excess 
of  activity  and  ambition  there  came  excess  of  repose  and 
indolence.  The  sultans,  who  passed  from  the  prison  to 
the  throne,  carried  there  no  acquaintance  with  men  or 
things,  and  their  ministers  were  like  them.  Venality  cor- 
rupted everything  in  both  the  civil  and  military  orders. 

While  the  world  was  marching  around  them  the  Otto- 
mans had  stopped.  Their  military  organization,  which  was 
superior  in  the  fifteenth  century  to  that  of  the  Europeans, 
not  having  been  improved,  had  become  exceedingly 
inferior.  The  janissaries  were  no  longer  a  defense  against 
danger  from  without;  at  home  they  were  a  continual  menace 
by  their  turbulent  disposition.  Finally,  Mussulman  disdain 
for  the  Christians  had  prevented  fusion,  so  they  were  less  a 
great  people  than  an  army  of  occupation  camped  north  of 
the  Bosphorus;  but  the  conquered,  allowed  by  Ottoman 
tolerance  to  exist  as  a  national  body,  formed  over  against 
them  a  mass  of  populations  two  or  three  times  more  numer- 
ous, who  opened  the  ear  and  extended  the  hand  to  every 
foreign  intrigue.  So  in  Turkey  there  was  forcible  superposi- 
tion of  the  smaller  number  upon  the  larger;  the  masters, 
whom  so  many  perils  surrounded,  wasted  two  centuries  in 
losing  their  aggressive  qualities,  in  increasing  their  vices 
and  consequently  in  diminishing  their  strength.  Is  it  any 
wonder,  then,  that  the  recollection  of  Mohammed  II.  and  of 
Soulei'man  I.  no  longer  excited  any  terror  in  Europe? 


CHAP.  XXVIII.]     DESTRUCTION  OF  POLAND,  461 

In  Turkey  there  was  a  center,  an  authority,  which  has 
made  it  endure.  In  Poland  there  was  none  whatsoever. 
An  immense  plain,  but  without  natural  boundaries,  Poland 
was  a  state,  geographically  badly  made;  furthermore  and 
above  all,  it  was  a  state  badly  organized  which  moved  in  an 
opposite  direction  from  Europe  and  civilization.  A  heroic 
struggle,  continued  three  or  four  centuries,  against  the  Mon- 
gols, the  Russians,  and  the  Ottomans,  had  developed  a 
most  brilliant  and  warlike  nobility,  but  no  burgesses,  no 
people.  The  peasant  was  a  serf.  One  hundred  thousand 
nobles  esteemed  themselves  all  equal  and  claimed  the  same 
rights.  In  the  general  diet  the  opposition  of  a  single 
deputy  blocked  everything — liberum  veto;  if  the  diet 
unanimously  voted  some  measure  which  a  few  nobles  did 
not  approve  they  banded  themselves  together  to  resist  it 
and  these  armed  insurrections  were  legal.  A  Pole  obeyed 
only  the  law  which  he  approved.  In  theory  this  was  beau- 
tiful; in  practice,  detestable;  from  it  resulted  perpetual 
anarchy.  They  had  adopted  in  1572  for  their  monarchy  the 
elective  system,  a  sort  of  government  which  would  be  the 
best  if  it  were  not  the  most  difficult,  and  which  can  only  be 
good  for  a  far-advanced  and  well-established  nation,  whom 
political  and  social  education  has  rendered  capable  of  its 
exercise.  In  Poland  this  regime  engendered  only  weakness 
and  confusion,  and  opened  the  door  to  every  intrigue  of  the 
foreigner.  Besides  they  had  reduced  this  elective  royalty  to 
nonentity,  leaving  it  neither  the  law  to  make,  nor  the  army 
to  command,  nor  justice  to  administer,  and  that  too  at  a  time 
when  all  Europe  bestowed  absolute  power  upon  its  kings, 
when  Europe  concentrated  in  a  single  hand  each  national 
force.  While  Gustavus  Adolphus,  Turenne,  Frederick  II., 
were  making  over  the  art  of  war, the  Poles  remained  a  magnifi- 
cent chivalry,  destitute  of  fortresses,  artillery,  or  engineer- 
ing. While  religious  hatreds  were  subsiding  they  renewed 
in  the  full  eighteenth  century  against  the  Lutheran  and  the 
Greek  dissenters  the  laws  of  the  most  evil  days  of  intoler- 
ance, and  they,  contemporaries  of  Voltaire,  manifested  all 
the  furies  of  the  league.  It  costs  something  to  utter  so 
severe  words  concerning  that  great  national  calamity. 
Nevertheless  it  is  indeed  necessary  for  the  world  to  know, 
as  a  lesson  to  mankind,  that  if  Poland  perished  it  was 
because  she  was  unwilling  to  save  herself  by  herself  curing 
her  evils.  But  her  enemies  put  forth  so  much  violence  and 


462  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [BOOK  VI. 

duplicity  in  slaying  her,  and  in  resisting  them  she  showed, 
during  her  last  moments,  so  heroic  a  courage,  that  she 
justly  gained  when  dying  an  immortal  renown. 

Catherine    II.    was    a    German,    a   princess   of    Anhalt- 

Zerbst;  she   endeavored  from   the  beginning  to  make  her 

origin  forgotten.     She  flattered  the  Muscovite 

Catherine     II.  -j      v  ,    ^i       i     i_ -. 

(1761-96);  First  pride  by  affecting  to  respect  the  habits  of  her 
fandI(x770°f  P°  subjects,  and  she  employed  foreigners,  but 
without  submitting  to  their  control.  To  mon- 
strous vices  she  joined  much  activity,  vigor,  and  penetration. 
She  completed  the  work  of  Peter  the  Great,  and  made  of 
the  Russian  empire  a  first-class  power. 

First  she  reinstated  Biren  in  the  duchy  of  Courland;  then 
after  the  death  of  Augustus  III.  she  proposed  as  King  of 
Poland  one  of  her  creatures,  Stanislaus  Poniatowski.  In 
spite  of  the  opposition  of  the  patriots,  who,  having  at  their 
head  the  intrepid  Mokranowski,  refused  to  deliberate  under 
the  intimidation  of  Russian  bayonets,  the  Russian  candidate 
was  proclaimed  under  the  name  of  Stanislaus  Augustus 
(September  7,  1764). 

Poland,  a  worm-eaten  colossus,  without  a  base  since  it 
had  no  people,  without  a  head,  because,  strictly  speaking, 
it  had  no  king,  could  be  saved  only  by  an  energetic  reform. 
Such  a  reform  neither  Russia  nor  Prussia  would  allow  to  be 
accomplished.  Frederick  II.,  who  had  no  scruples  of  any 
sort,  long  revolved  in  his  mind  the  plan  of  a  dismemberment 
of  Poland  which  would  give  him  the  territory  situated 
between  his  Prussian  provinces  and  Pomerania.  Early  he 
sounded  the  Czarina  upon  the  subject,  but  Catherine 
feigned  that  she  did  not  understand,  already  reserving 
Poland  for  herself  alone.  They  agreed,  however,  upon  one 
point,  the  continuation  of  anarchy  in  the  unhappy  state, 
and,  before  the  election  of  Poniatowski,  concluded  a  treaty 
of  alliance  wherein  the  maintenance  of  the  Polish  constitu- 
tion was  stipulated. 

It  was  not  difficult  to  press  the  Poles  to  dangerous  resolu- 
tions: the  affair  of  the  dissenters  served  as  a  pretext. 
Catherine  declared  that  she  took  them  under  her  protection, 
and  compelled  the  diet  to  repeal  the  laws  enacted  against 
them.  The  bishops  protested.  The  Russian  ambassador 
had  two  of  them  arrested,  whom  he  sent  to  Siberia.  Rome 
was  indignant;  Voltaire  applauded;  Frederick  II.  waited. 
He  did  not  wait  long.  The  Catholics  formed  the  Confedera- 


CHAP.  XXVIII.]     DESTRUCTION  OF  POLAND.  463 

tion  of  Bar  (March  i,  1768),  which  took  as  its  standard  a 
picture  of  the  Virgin  and  the  infant  Jesus.  The  Latin  cross 
marched  against  the  Greek  cross;  the  peasants  slaughtered 
their  lords;  Poland  waded  in  blood.  The  Prussians  entered 
in  the  western  provinces,  the  Austrians  in  the  county  of 
Zips ;  the  Russians  were  everywhere. 

England,  already  anxious  at  the  disposition  shown  by  her 
American  colonies,  kept  herself  apart  from  continental 
affairs.  In  France  Choiseul  sought  means  of  saving  Poland 
but  found  none.  The  Duke  d'Aiguillon,  his  successor,  had 
made  up  his  mind  in  advance  to  its  abandonment.  How- 
ever, action  was  taken  at  Constantinople,  and  the  sultan, 
persuaded  by  de  Vergennes,  the  French  ambassador, 
declared  war  against  Russia  because  of  a  violation  of  his 
territory  by  the  Zaporogian  Cossacks,  who  had  pursued 
even  upon  Ottoman  soil  some  of  the  confederates  of  Bar 
(1768).  But  the  armies  of  Catherine  had  everywhere  the 
advantage:  at  Khotzim  and  Azof  in  1769;  at  Bender  near 
Ismail  in  1770;  Moldavia  and  Wallachia  were  occupied, 
and  a  Russian  fleet,  commanded  by  English  officers,  burned 
the  Ottoman  fleet  in  the  Bay  of  Tcheshme  southwest  of 
Smyrna.  All  Europe  applauded  at  this  disaster.  The 
barbarians,  they  said,  must  be  driven  from  Europe,  and  with 
joy  they  saw  the  Russians  charge  themselves  with  their 
expulsion.  One  man  alone,  Montesquieu,  judged  that  the 
Ottoman  power  was  necessary  to  the  European  balance  of 
power.  But  Austria,  troubled  by  the  progress  of  Catherine 
II.  upon  the  lower  Danube,  signed  a  secret  treaty  with  the 
Porte.  Frederick  also  was  alarmed.  He  brought  back 
Catherine  II.  to  the  affairs  of  Poland  by  letting  a  glimpse 
be  caught  of  the  menacing  union  of  Prussia  and  Austria. 
His  brother  Henry  went  to  St.  Petersburg  to  persuade  the 
empress. 

The  spoliation  was  not  accomplished  without  a  struggle. 
But  the  defenders  of  Poland,  Pulawski,  the  French 
Dumouriez,  whom  the  Duke  de  Choiseul  had  sent  there, 
and  Oginski,  a  great  general  of  Lithuania,  could  not  by 
their  courage  make  up  for  numbers.  They  were  even 
abandoned  by  the  Ottomans,  who  signed  an  armistice  with 
Russia.  A  handful  of  French  officers  and  soldiers  under 
the  brave  Choisy  resisted  heroically  in  Cracow  and  endured 
a  long  siege.  The  king,  Stanislaus  Augustus,  as  if  it  was 
no  concern  of  himself  or  of  his  country,  let  things  go  and 


464  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

remained  at  Warsaw  in  the  midst  of  the  Russians.  To 
make  an  end  the  three  courts  declared  that  whoever  took 
up  arms  in  Poland  should  be  treated  as  brigands  and  incen- 
diaries; and  (August  5)  at  St.  Petersburg  they  concluded 
the  treaty  of  partition,  of  which  (September  5)  their  ambas- 
sadors gave  notice  to  the  king  and  republic  of  Poland. 
Maria  Theresa,  the  empress  queen,  Catherine  II.,  Empress 
of  all  the  Russias,  and  Frederick  II.,  King  of  Prussia,  wish- 
ing, they  said,  to  arrest  the  flow  of  blood  in  Poland  and  to 
restore  tranquillity,  had  resolved  to  enforce  their  rights 
to  several  Polish  provinces.  In  consequence  the  three 
powers  demanded  the  convocation  of  the  diet  in  order  that 
it  might  arrange  with  them  the  new  boundaries  of  the 
republic.  The  diet  was  held  at  Warsaw  (April  19,  1773) 
and  the  treaty  was  there  accepted.  Russia  obtained 
all  the  country  situated  east  of  the  Dwina,  that  is  to  say, 
Polish  Livonia,  all  the  palatinate  of  Mycislaw,  the  extremities 
of  the  palatinate  of  Minsk,  and  a  part  of  the  palatinates  of 
Witepsk  and  Polotsk;  Austria  reserved  to  herself  Galicia 
and  Lodomeria  with  the  rich  salt  works  of  Wielicza  and 
Sambar  ;  Prussia  acquired  Prussian  Poland,  save  Dantzic 
and  Thorn,  together  with  Great  Poland  as  far  as  Netz, 
thereby  uniting  the  province  of  Prussia  to  its  German  states 
and  putting  under  its  control  the  larger  part  of  the  commerce 
of  Poland.  These  provinces  had  been  occupied  even  before 
the  end  of  the  year  1772.  The  three  powers  elsewhere 
guaranteed  to  Poland  the  rest  of  its  possessions. 

The  same  year,  1773,  when  that  great  iniquity  was 
accomplished  an  adventurer  named  Pugatscheff,  first  a 
soldier,  then  a  deserter,  finally  a  bandit,  gave  himself  out 
among  the  Cossacks,  his  compatriots,  as  Peter  III.,  who  had 
escaped  from  his  assassins.  He  got  together  a  numerous 
army,  made  rapid  progress,  thanks  to  a  war  against  the 
Ottomans  which  had  stripped  southwestern  Russia  of 
troops,  spread  terror  in  Moscow,  which  he  ought  to  have 
attacked  instead  of  losing  his  time  at  the  siege  of  Orenburg, 
where  he  was  repulsed  by  Prince  Galitzin,  and  captured 
and  sacked  Kazan.  But  he  had  alienated  the  minds  of  the 
people  by  ravaging  everything  on  his  march ;  so  his  party 
diminished  little  by  little.  He  was  finally  betrayed  by  one 
of  his  accomplices  in  consideration  of  100,000  rubles, 
taken  to  Moscow  in  an  iron  cage,  and  beheaded  with  five  of 
his  partisans  (1775). 


CHAP.  XXVIII.]     DESTRUCTION  OF  POLAND.  4^5 

Hostilities  with  Turkey,  momentarily  interrupted  in  1772, 

had  recommenced  in  1773.     The  war  was  at  first  favorable 

T         .         f  to  the  Ottomans,  who  twice  caused  the  siege 

KaVnardji  (1774)   of  Silistria  to  be  raised,  but  at  last  inclined 

and  jassy  (1791).   tothe  side  of   Russia.      General   Romanzoff 

beat  the  Grand  Vizier  near  Kainardji  in  Bulgaria,  forty- 
two  miles  south  of  Silistria,  and  (July  10,  1774)  forced  the 
Ottomans  to  accept  the  treaty  of  Kainardji,  which  over- 
threw to  the  advantage  of  Russia  the  balance  of  power 
in  eastern  Europe.  Turkey  recognized  the  independence 
of  the  Tartars  of  the  Crimea  and  the  Kouban,  who 
soon  underwent  the  Russian  influence,  accorded  to  the  Rus- 
sians free  navigation  of  the  Black  Sea,  and  ceded  Kinburn 
at  the  mouth  of  the  Dnieper,  Yenikale,  Kertch,  Azof,  and 
Taganrog,  together  with  the  tongue  of  land  included  be- 
tween the  Dnieper  and  the  Bog.  She  also  agreed  to  pay  a 
war  indemnity  of  4,500,000  rubles.  Turkey  was  to  grant 
an  amnesty  to  the  Greeks  who  had  come  to  the  assistance 
of  the  Russians,  and  to  acknowledge  the  Czar's  right  to  a 
protectorate  over  Moldo-Wallachia.  The  treaty  stipulated 
nothing  for  Poland,  the  occasion  and  cause  of  the  war. 
Even  this  silence  was  a  ratification  of  the  iniquity  of  1772. 

The  following  year  (1775)  Catherine  subjugated  the  for- 
midable republic  of  the  Zaporogian  Cossacks,  who  formed 
a  half-independent  state  in  the  empire,  lived  by  brigandage, 
and  arrested  the  consolidation  of  Russian  authority  north  of 
the  Black  Sea. 

The  partition  of  Poland  had  only  whetted  the  appetite'  for 
similar  acquisitive  enterprises.  In  1777  Austria  wished  to 
take  Bavaria.  This  time  Russia  opposed;  and  by  the  treaty 
of  Teschen  (1779),  of  which  she  together  with  France  be- 
came guarantee  in  consequence  of  the  right  she  obtained  of 
enforcing  its  stipulations,  she  opened  up  Germany  to  her- 
self; two  years  later,  in  order  to  more  easily  prosecute  her 
intrigues,  she  appointed  ministers  resident  to  the  petty  Ger- 
man courts.  But  what  she  forbade  to  Austria  she  permitted 
to  herself  on  a  vaster  scale.  The  Ottomans  were  in  full 
decline :  why  should  they  not  meet  the  same  fate  as  the  Poles? 
As  early  as  the  year  1777  Catherine,  in  contempt  of  the 
treaty  of  Kainardji,  had  had  her  troops  enter  the  Crimea, 
whose  khan  sold  her  its  sovereignty  in  consideration  of  a 
pension  which  was  not  paid.  In  1783  she  took  possession 
of  it,  and  in  1786  Potemkin  commenced  the  erection  of 


466  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.        [Book  VI. 

Sebastopol.  She  also  seized  the  country  of  Kouban,  and 
made  Heraclius,  King  of  Georgia,  accept  her  protection. 
The  Russian  domination  was  crossing  the  Caucasus.  The 
Czarina  carried  her  views  farther  still.  She  gave  the  second 
of  her  grandchildren  the  name  of  Constantine;  she  had  a 
medal  struck  with  his  bust  and  on  the  reverse  Constanti- 
nople with  the  Seven  Towers  shattered  by  the  thunderbolt. 
Ostentatiously  she  announced  her  schemes  by  a  triumphal 
journey  in  Tauris  (1787), during  which  she  came  to  an  under- 
standing with  Joseph  II.  for  the  division  of  the  Ottoman 
empire.  At  Kherson  a  triumphal  arch  bore  a  Greek 
inscription,  of  which  the  English  minister  gave  a  somewhat 
free  translation  in  the  words  "Road  to  Byzantium."  The 
translator  was  wrong,  but  the  ambassador  was  right.  In 
fact,  Catherine  about  that  time  had  with  Count  de  Segur  a 
conversation  which  her  grandson  Nicholas  resumed  in  1853 
with  Sir  Hamilton  Seymour.  "Nothing  would  be  more 
easy,"  she  said,  "than  to  hurl  the  Turks  back  into  Asia. 
France  should  have  Crete  or  Egypt  as  its  share." 

The  Divan  replied  to  these  provocations  by  a  declaration 
of  war  (1787).  Attacked  both  by  the  Russians  and  Aus- 
trians,  the  Ottomans  were  assisted  only  by  the  King  of 
Sweden,  Gustavus  III.,  who  after  a  bold  dash  in  Finland, 
finding  himself  betrayed  by  his  nobility  and  menaced  by 
Denmark,  signed  the  peace  of  Vareta  (1790).  However,  the 
Ottomans  at  first  bravely  resisted  their  assailants:  the  Aus- 
trians  were  driven  beyond  the  Save,  Joseph  II.  was  defeated 
at  Temesvar,  and  the  Russians  were  worsted  in  a  naval  bat- 
tle in  sight  of  Sebastopol  (1788).  But  Khotzim  and 
Otchakof  were  captured;  the  following  year  the  Russians 
were  victors  at  Fockschany;  the  Austrians  took  Belgrade, 
Potemkin  made  himself  master  of  Bender,  and  Suwarrow 
entered  Ismail  after  frightful  carnage.  Fortunately  the 
suspicions  of  Prussia  awoke;  she  concluded  an  alliance  with 
the  Porte.  Holland  and  England  joined  her,  and  at  the  con- 
ferences of  Reichenback  obliged  Leopold,  successor  of 
Joseph  II.,  who  died  in  1790,  to  grant  the  Ottomans  the 
peace  of  Sistova  (1791),  which  cost  Turkey  only  Orsova  and 
a  district  of  Croatia  on  the  left  bank  of  the  upper  Unna. 
At  the  same  time  80,000  Prussians  collected  in  sight  of  the 
Russian  frontiers.  Catherine  II.,  disturbed  by  these  hostile 
manifestations,  accepted  the  preliminaries  of  Galatz  (1791). 
The  treaty  of  Jassy  named  the  Dniester  as  the  boundary  of 


CHAP.  XXVIII.]    DESTRUCTION  OF  POLAND.  467 

the  two  empires.  Russia  retained  the  fortress  of  Otchakof, 
the  Crimea,  and  the  Kouban  (1792).  She  had  expended  in 
her  conquests,  it  is  said,  150,000  men;  but  that  was  an  out- 
lay which  the  Czarina  did  not  heed. 

Poland  paid  for  Turkey.     The  first  dismemberment  had 

opened  men's  eyes,  and  everybody  in  the  kingdom  under- 

^   stood  that  the  only  way  to  save  the  country 

Second       and  ,  J        . J.      ,  .        .  _,,  * 

Third  partitions  was  to  change  its  anarchical  constitution.  The 
and^°95Jnd  ^^  successor  of  Frederick  II.  encouraged  the 
reformers  through  fear  of  Russia,  and  promised 
his  alliance  if  the  army  should  be  raised  to  a  well-organized 
force  of  60,000  men.  The  diet  decreed  that  the  liberumveto 
and  the  law  of  unanimity  should  be  abolished;  that  the  legis- 
lative power  should  be  shared  by  the  king,  senate,  and  nuntios, 
and  the  executive  power  intrusted  to  a  hereditary  king.  The 
most  lively  enthusiasm  burst  out  in  the  nation  (1791).  But 
time  was  lost  in  decreeing  these  reforms;  when  ready  for 
enforcement  the  inclinations  of  Prussia  had  changed.  She 
had  returned  to  her  alliance  with  Austria  because  of  affairs 
in  France,  and  intending  with  Austria  to  stifle  one  revolu- 
tion in  Paris,  she  could  not  favor  another  at  Warsaw. 
Poland,  abandoned  to  herself,  vainly  dispatched  8000  sol- 
diers, commanded  by  Koskiusko,  to  contend  with  20,000 
Russians:  she  was  anew  dismembered  under  the  pretext 
that  the  Polish  patriots  were  Jacobins.  By  two  treaties, 
signed  July  13  and  September  25,  1793,  Russia  took  half  of 
Lithuania,  Podolia,  the  remainder  of  the  palatinates  of  Po- 
lotsk and  Minsk,  a  portion  of  the  palatinate  of  Wilna,  half 
of  the  palatinates  of  Novogrodek,  Brzesc,  and  Volhynia. 
Prussia  obtained  the  major  part  of  Great  Poland,  with 
Thorn  and  Dantzic,  which  she  had  coveted  for  a  long  time, 
together  with  Czenstokow  in  Little  Poland.  As  in  1776,  a 
derisive  clause  guaranteed  to  the  republic  integrity  of  the 
possessions  which  were  left. 

This  scandalous  iniquity  brought  about  an  uprising. 
Koskiusko,  at  the  head  of  4000  badly  armed  Poles,  and 
counting  upon  the  support  of  Austria,  who  had  not  taken 
part  in  the  second  dismemberment,  marched  against  the 
enemy  and  defeated  12,000  Russians  at  Raslawice.  War- 
saw expelled  its  garrison,  and  the  insurrection  rapidly  spread 
(1794).  But  it  lacked  material  means;  it  was  distracted  by 
internal  divisions.  The  accession  of  Austria  to  the  coali- 
tion of  Prussia  and  Russia  was  a  mortal  blow  to  the  Poles. 


468  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.         [BOOK  VI. 

Koskiusko,  conquered  by  Suwarrow  at  Maciejowice  (October 
10),  fell  covered  with  wounds  and  crying  "Finis  Poloniae!" 
He  was  captured  with  his  friend  the  poet  Niemcevitch  and 
carried  to  Russia,  where  he  remained  in  captivity  till  the 
death  of  Catherine.  Suwarrow  marched  at  once  on  Warsaw 
and  seized  it  after  the  assault  of  Praga,  which  recalled  that 
of  Ismail.  Poniatowski  abdicated  for  a  pension  of  200,000 
ducats,  which  he  did  not  long  receive,  dying  soon  after  at  St. 
Petersburg  (February  n,  1797).  The  definitive  partition 
of  the  country  was  concluded  between  the  three  powers. 
Austria  had  the  larger  part  of  the  palatinate  of  Cracow  and 
those  of  Sandomir  and  Lublin,  and  thus  extended  as  far  as 
the  upper  course  of  the  Bog;  Prussia  obtained  the  districts 
between  the  Niemen  as  far  as  Grodno  and  the  Bog  with 
Bialistok  and  Plotsk.  Russia  kept  the  rest  (1795).  Thus 
was  consummated  that  shameful  violation  of  international 
law  which  blotted  the  country  of  Sobieski  from  the  map  of 
Europe — an  iniquity  doubly  fatal,  both  from  what  it  did  and 
from  what  it  authorized  to  be  done.  If  in  the  treaties 
which  followed  the  great  wars  of  the  coalition  the  people 
and  the  countries  were  divided  like  flocks  and  farms  at  the 
convenience  of  the  conquerors  of  the  day,  it  was  but  the 
application  of  examples  given  by  the  authors  of  that  vast 
spoliation. 

Catherine  the  Great  died  the  following  year  (November 
9,  1796)  from  an  apoplectic  stroke.  She  was,  for  good  as 
for  evil,  a  remarkable  woman.  She  caused  voyages  of  dis- 
covery or  scientific  explorations  to  be  undertaken  by  Pallas, 
Falko,  and  Billings,  and  she  flattered  western  civilization  in 
the  person  of  its  chief  representatives;  she  carried  on  a  cor- 
respondence with  Voltaire  and  the  encyclopedists,  invited 
d'Alembert  and  Diderot  to  reside  near  her,  and  herself 
translated  the  "Belisaire"  of  Marmontel.  She  solemnly 
assembled  deputies  from  all  the  provinces  to  have  them 
write  a  constitution  of  the  empire  which  was  not  written. 
She  allowed  the  question  of  abolition  of  serfdom  to  be  agi- 
tated, concerning  which  Montesquieu  had  just  said:  "The 
slave  owner  insensibly  accustoms  himself  to  the  lack  of  all 
moral  virtues  and  becomes  proud,  hasty,  harsh,  choleric, 
voluptuous,  and  cruel."  But  not  a  serf  was  freed.  She 
invited  foreigners  to  Russia,  but  permitted  very  few  Russians 
to  visit  foreign  countries.  The  Governor  of  Moscow  lament- 
ing that  the  schools  remained  empty,  she  replied  to  him, 


CHAP.  XXVIII.]     DESTRUCTION  OF  POLAND.  469 

"My  dear  prince,  do  not  complain  that  the  Russians  have 
no  desire  for  instruction;  if  I  institute  schools  it  is  not  for 
us,  it  is  for  Europe,  where  we  must  keep  our  position  in 
public  opinion.  But  the  day  when  our  peasants  shall  wish 
to  become  enlightened  both  you  and  I  will  lose  our 
places." 

Sweden  was  menaced  by  the  same  fate  as  Poland,  because 
it  also  was  divided  by  factions,  by  the  French  party,  or  the 
Hats,  and  the  Russian  party,  or  the  Caps,  and  because  at 
Stockholm  as  at  Warsaw  the  monarchy  had  no  strength. 
In  1741  the  Hats  caused  war  to  be  declared  against  Russia 
so  as  to  destroy  the  treaty  of  Nystadt ;  this  war  turned  out 
badly,  and  without  the  assistance  of  England,  who  inter- 
posed her  mediation,  Sweden  would  have  lost  Finland. 
By  the  treaty  of  Abo  (1743)  she  ceded  only  a  few  districts. 
From  that  day  the  influence  of  Russia  preponderated  in 
Sweden,  and  the  money  and  promises  of  the  foreigner  main- 
tained the  factions  which  prevented  the  reorganization  of 
the  country.  The  king,  Adolphus  Frederick  (1751-71), 
constantly  dreamed  of  the  revolution  which  his  son  Gustavus 
III.  accomplished;  but  he  recoiled  before  the  menaces  of 
his  two  powerful  neighbors.  We  remember  the  treaty  of 
1764,  which  served  as  a  point  of  departure  for  the  dismem- 
berment of  Poland;  a  like  convention,  which  became 
known  only  in  1847,  was  concluded  between  Prussia  and 
Russia  for  the  maintenance  of  the  constitution,  that  is  to 
say,  of  the  anarchy,  of  Sweden.  The  decision  of  Gustavus 
III.  prevented  its  realization.  His  coup  d'ttat  of  August 
19,  1772,  completed  by  the  constitutional  act  of  1789,  was 
successful.  The  aristocracy,  which  was  surrendering  the 
country  to  the  foreigner,  was  obliged  to  restore  his  necessary 
prerogatives  to  the  king.  The  war  which  Gustavus  III. 
declared  against  the  Russians  in  1788,  in  which  he  destroyed 
their  fleet  at  the  naval  battle  of  Swenska  Sound  (1790), 
Avould  have  perhaps  indemnified  Sweden  for  some  of  its 
losses  if  the  king  had  not  been  betrayed  by  nobles  among 
his  officers,  who  two  years  after  caused  his  assassination 
(March  16,  1792).  A  mad  king,  Gustavus  IV.,  a  weak 
king,  Charles  XIII.,  and  the  election  as  heir  presumptive  of 
Marshal  Bernadotte,  who  forgot  France  to  throw  himself 
into  the  arms  of  Russia,  caused  the  fall  of  Sweden  into  a 
sort  of  vassalage  to  the  Czars,  whence  the  almost  recent  war 
of  the  Crimea  has  only  just  enabled  her  to  escape. 


BOOK  VII. 

PRELIMINARIES  OF  THE  FRENCH 
REVOLUTION. 


CHAPTER  XXIX. 

SCIENCES  AND  LETTERS  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH 
CENTURY. 


Scientific  and  Geographical  Discoveries. — Letters  and  Arts. 


THE  eighteenth  century  was   for  the  sciences  what  the 

seventeenth  had  been  for  letters  and  the  sixteenth  for  the 

_  .    .....  arts,  an  epoch  of  immense  progress  and  almost 

Scientific  and          .  F  _. 

geographical  of  creation.  Physics  was  regenerated  by 
Franklin  and  Volta,  mathematical  analysis  by 
La  Grange  and  La  Place;  botany  by  Linnaeus  and  de  Jus- 
sieu  ;  zoology  by  Buffon,  who  moreover  popularized  geology; 
while  Lavoisier  gave  firm  foundations  to  chemical  science. 
At  the  same  time  learned  navigators  continued  the  work  of 
the  great  sailors  of  the  fifteenth  century  and  carried  almost 
to  perfection  the  investigation  of  our  globe. 

Descartes,  Pascal,  Newton,  and  Leibnitz  had  enabled 
mathematics  to  make  marked  progress  and  had  created  new 
branches  of  science.  It  remained  to  render  practical  the 
lofty  conceptions  of  those  grand  geniuses  and  to  advance 
in  the  path  which  they  had  opened.  This  was  the  task  of 
the  learned  men  of  the  eighteenth  century,  of  Euler,  Clai- 
raut,  d'Alembert,  and  principally  of  La  Grange  and  La 
Place.  La  Grange  manifested  rare  precocity.  At  nineteen 
he  solved  a  problem  proposed  by  Euler;  the  following  year 
he  wrote  the  first  essays  of  that  "Method  of  Variations," 
which  alone  would  suffice  to  immortalize  his  name.  To  enu- 
merate all  the  labors  of  his  eminently  investigating  mind 


47 2  THE  FRENCH  RE  VOL  U  TIOX.          \  \ '.  «  .K  VII 

would  require  too  much  time.  It  suffices  to  say  that  he 
carried  pure  analysis  to  the  highest  degree  of  perfection,  that 
he  developed  the  differential  and  the  integral  calculus,  the 
discovery  of  which  Newton  and  Leibnitz  disputed  with  each 
other,  and  that  none  else  has  spoken  a  language  at  once  so 
elegant  and  so  clear  in  the  exposition  of  the  most  abstruse 
theories.  He  was  born  at  Turin  of  parents  of  French 
origin  and  died  at  Paris  in  1813.  Napoleon  had  made  him 
senator.  La  Place  (1749-1827),  son  of  a  poor  peasant  of 
the  valley  of  Auge  in  lower  Normandy,  owed  to  d'Alembert 
the  first  employment  which  permitted  him  to  reside  at 
Paris.  In  his  "Mecanique  Celeste"  he  gave  a  complete 
demonstration  of  the  different  astronomical  laws  which 
control  the  system  of  the  universe.  Thereby  he  completed 
the  work  of  his  illustrious  predecessors,  so  that  mathe- 
matical astronomy  owes  to  him  no  less  than  to  Newton  and 
Kepler.  His  "Exposition  of  the  system  of  the  World"  is  a 
model  of  purity  and  elegance;  his  "Theory  of  Probabilities" 
has  become  classic  and  has  furnished  the  chief  principles 
of  similar  works  that  have  been  published  since.  La  Place 
died  almost  in  our  time,  loaded  with  honors  by  Napoleon 
and  Louis  XVIII.  He  was  Minister  of  the  Interior 
during  six  weeks  after  the  fall  of  the  Directory  in  1799; 
under  the  empire  he  was  senator  and  count.  After  the 
restoration  he  received  the  title  of  marquis.  His  works  were 
reprinted  in  1844  at  the  expense  of  the  state. 

Lalande  (1732-1807)  by  no  means  accomplished  so 
important  labors,  but  he  popularized  the  study  of  astronomy 
by  continuous  lessons  through  forty  years  at  the  College 
of  France.  Euler  of  Basel  (1707-83),  perfected  differ- 
ential and  integral  calculus,  reduced  analytical  operations 
to  a  greater  simplicity,  and  wrote  in  French  to  the  Ger- 
man Princess  of  Anhalt-Dessau,  niece  of  the  King  of 
Prussia,  his  celebrated  "Letters,"  wherein  he  treats  of 
physics,  metaphysics,  and  logic.  Clairaut  (1714-65), 
geometrician  and  astronomer,  at  the  age  of  fifteen  pre- 
sented interesting  memoirs  to  the  Academy  of  Sciences, 
and  at  eighteen  was  received  as  a  member  into  that  society. 
He  went  to  Lapland  (1736)  to  measure  near  the  pole  a 
degree  of  the  meridian  which  Bouguer  and  La  Condamine 
measured  at  the  equator.  Some  time  afterward  Lacaille 
established  himself  at  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  in  order  to 
draw  up  the  map  of  the  southern  heavens.  We  have  already 


CHAP.  XXIX.]      SCIENCES  AND  LETTERS.  473 

spoken  of  d'Alembert  (1717-83)  who  also  made  himself 
known  at  the  age  of  twenty-two  by  learned  memoirs.  He 
was  both  a  great  geometrician  and  an  able  writer;  and  to 
this  double  glory  he  added  another,  that  of  resisting  the 
most  seductive  offers  of  monarchs  in  order  to  remain  in 
France  at  the  head  of  the  Academy  of  Sciences.  Among 
his  works  are:  "Treatise  on  Dynamics,"  "Treatise  on 
Fluids,"  "Reflections  upon  the  Winds,"  "Researches  at 
Different  Points  upon  the  System  of  the  World,"  and  "Pre- 
liminary Discourse  of  the  Encyclopedia."  Bailly  (1736- 
93)  is  more  celebrated  by  his  role  in  the  Revolution  than 
by  his  "History  of  Astronomy,"  which,  however,  brought 
him  much  honor.  Monge  (1746-1818)  created  descriptive 
geometry.  The  English  Bradley  (1692-1762)  discovered 
the  aberration  of  light  and  the  nutation  of  the  terrestrial 
axis.  William  Herschel  (1738-1822),  a  simple  organist 
who  became  by  force  of  will  a  profound  astronomer,  fabri- 
cated and  perfected  the  instruments  he  was  too  poor  to 
buy;  he  discovered  Uranus,  two  satellites  of  Saturn,  and 
the  movement  of  our  solar  system  toward  the  constellation 
of  Hercules ;  by  an  attentive  study  of  the  nebulse  he  created 
stellar  astronomy. 

Physics,  to  which  Bacon  applied  experiment,  had  fallen 
with  Descartes  into  the  regions  of  hypothesis,  from 
which  the  eighteenth  century  set  it  free;  since  then  it 
has  progressed  rapidly.  Two  men  especially  during  that 
period  contributed  to  the  advancement  of  that  science, 
Franklin  and  Volta.  They  recognized,  studied,  and  investi- 
gated profoundly  the  marvelously  varied  effects  of  that 
mysterious  agent  which  we  call  electricity.  Born  at  Boston 
in  1706,  Franklin  had  educated  himself  all  alone  without 
the  assistance  of  any  master.  Loving  mankind,  although 
he  understood  men  thoroughly,  he  cultivated  science,  not 
for  his  pleasure  or  vanity,  but  to  increase  the  welfare  of  his 
fellows.  Thus  having  demonstrated  at  the  peril  of  his  life 
that  the  electricity  of  the  clouds  is  the  same  as  that  of  the 
machines,  and  having  observed  the  properties  of  points,  he 
immediately  applied  this  principle  to  the  preservation  of 
public  and  private  edifices,  and  Philadelphia,  his  adopted 
city,  was  covered  with  lightning  rods.  He  especially 
excelled  in  the  difficult  art  of  popularizing  science:  his 
Almanac  and  his  "Sayings  of  Poor  Richard"  did  for  the 
United  States  what  all  the  ordinances  imaginable  could  not 


474  THE   FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

have  done.  "What  are  balloons  worth?"  one  asked  him. 
"What  is  the  newborn  child  worth?"  he  replied. 

The  Italian  Volta  from  Como  early  showed  extraordinary 
sagacity  in  the  conduct  of  experiments.  Physics  owes  him 
a  number  of  ingenious  instruments,  such  as  the  electro- 
phorus,  the  electric  condenser,  and  the  electroscope.  But 
his  chief  discovery  is  that  of  the  fruitful  principle  that 
the  contact  of  bodies  is  a  source  of  electricity.  Gal- 
vani  of  Bologna  in  1791  had  discovered  those  singular  phe- 
nomena of  electricity  to  which  his  name  has  been  given. 
Three  years  later  Volta  invented  the  pile,  which,  perfected, 
has  wrought  in  chemistry,  commerce,  and  manufactures  a 
profound  revolution.  Loaded  with  honors  by  Napoleon, 
this  grand  physicist  died  as  recently  as  1826  at  the  age  of 
eighty-one. 

We  shall  mention  also  Reaumur  (1683-1757),  who  con- 
structed the  thermometer  which  bears  his  name,  and  who 
perhaps  is  still  more  celebrated  as  a  naturalist  than  as  a 
physicist;  he  wrote  "Memoirs  to  Serve  in  the  History  of 
Insects";  Coulomb  (1736-1806),  inventor  of  the  torsion 
balance  which  bears  his  name,  and  by  which  he  dis- 
covered the  laws  of  electric  and  magnetic  attraction  and 
repulsion;  the  Marquis  of  Jouffroy,  who  in  1783  ascended 
the  Saone  in  the  first  steamboat,  an  invention  which  then 
unfortunately  remained  useless;  Montgolfier,  who  that  same 
year  made  the  first  ascension  in  an  air  balloon.  In  Eng- 
land Stales  (1677-1761)  devised  ventilators;  Watt  (1736- 
1819)  invented  the  condenser,  gave  mathematical  precision 
to  the  steam  engine,  and  economized  two-thirds  of  the  fuel, 
so  that  an  invention  which  had  remained  almost  barren 
became  one  of  the  most  powerful  instruments  of  modern 
industry.  In  Italy  Fontana  (1730-1805)  made  profound 
researches  in  physics  and  chemistry,  and  was  one  of  the  first 
to  represent  in  colored  wax  the  parts  of  the  human  body. 

Until  the  eighteenth  century  chemistry,  through  lack  of 
an  intelligent  method,  had  been  able  to  make  little  real 
progress.  A  great  number  of  phenomena  had  been  observed, 
but  ability  was  lacking  to  deduce  from  them  any  general 
law.  The  theory  of  the  German  physician  Stahl  (1660- 
1734)  upon  phlogiston,  a  peculiar  principle  existing  in  com- 
bustible bodies,  and  escaping  from  them  during  combustion, 
had  led  astray  the  most  sagacious  intellects.  It  was  Lavoi- 
sier who  made  of  chemistry  a  real  science.  In  1775  he 


CHAP.  XXIX.]      SCIENCES  AND    LETTERS.  475 

demonstrated  that  the  combustion  of  bodies  and  the  calcina- 
tion of  metals  are  the  result  of  the  union  of  oxygen  with 
those  bodies,  and  that  the  escape  of  heat  which  is  then  pro- 
duced has  as  its  cause  the  change  in  the  condition  of  the 
oxygen.  In  1784  he  decomposed  water,  which  he  found 
was  formed  of  oxygen  and  hydrogen.  The  theory  of  phlo- 
giston was  already  overturned,  as  well  as  that  of  the  four 
elements.  A  chemical  nomenclature  remained  to  be  estab- 
lished. This  was  the  achievement  of  Morveau,  but  Lavoi- 
sier, Berthollet,  and  Fourcroy  were  associated  with  that 
great  reform.  They  all  signed  the  famous  memoir  of  1787. 
"Chemistry  is  easy  now,"  said  La  Grange;  "one  learns  it 
just  like  algebra."  Berthollet  (1748-1822)  discovered  the 
decoloring  properties  of  chlorine  and  those  of  carbon  for 
purifying  water;  Fourcroy  (1765-1809)  discovered  several 
compounds  detonating  on  percussion,  and  perfected  the 
analysis  of  mineral  waters  and  of  animal  substances;  the 
Scotchman  Black  (1728-97)  was  the  first  to  suspect  the 
existence  of  carbonic  acid,  which  he  called  "fixed  air,"  and 
made  known  latent  heat;  Cavendish  (1731-1810)  analyzed 
the  properties  of  hydrogen  gas  and  disputed  with  Lavoisier 
the  honor  of  having  discovered  the  composition  of  water; 
Priestley  (1733-1805)  was  the  first  to  isolate  oxygen,  which 
opened  the  road  for  Lavoisier;  Scheele  of  Stralsund  (1742- 
86)  discovered  chlorine  and  many  other  chemical  elements. 
What  Lavoisier  had  done  for  chemistry  Buffon  and  Lin- 
naeus did,  the  former  for  zoology,  the  latter  for  botany. 
Both  were  born  in  1707,  Buffon  at  Montbard  in  Burgundy, 
Linnseus  at  Raeshult  in  Sweden.  Appointed  intendant  of 
the  Royal  Garden,  Buffon  consecrated  no  less  than  fifty 
years  to  the  study  of  nature.  His  thirty-six  volumes  of 
"Natural  History"  succeeded  each  other  without  interrup- 
tion from  1749  to  1788,  and  are  universally  admired  for 
majesty  of  style  and  beauty  of  description.  Buffon  is 
reproached  for  having  immoderately  employed  hypotheses 
in  his  "Epochs  of  Nature."  None  the  less  there  remains 
to  him  the  glory  of  having  founded  geology.  By  laying 
down  the  grand  principle  that  the  present  condition  of  our 
globe  results  from  changes  of  which  it  is  possible  to  trace 
the  history,  he  pointed  out  the  way  to  Cuvier  and  Elie  de 
Beamount.  Linnaeus,  the  reformer  of  botany,  was  at  first 
a  shoemaker's  apprentice,  and  no  free  play  was  afforded  to 
his  genius  till  he  was  twenty-three  years  old.  First  it  was 


476  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

necessary  to  find  a  method.  Learned  men  classed  vege- 
tables only  according  to  their  bulk  or  their  external  appear- 
ances. Linnaeus  was  able  to  penetrate  the  intimate  mys- 
teries of  plant  reproduction,  and  proposed  the  sexual  method. 
Though  to-day  abandoned  for  the  natural  method,  which  de 
Jussieu  founded  on  the  subordination  of  the  character  of 
plants,  his  classification  none  the  less  indicated  great  prog- 
ress. Besides,  there  is  in  his  works,  as  in  his  "Systema 
Naturae"  and  "Philosophica  Botanica, "  something  which 
will  never  perish;  above  all,  his  nomenclature  and  also  his 
descriptions,  so  original  and  so  exact.  At  the  side  of  Buffon 
place  must  be  reserved  for  his  co-laborers,  Daubenton 
(1716-99),  to  whom  we  owe  a  "History  of  Animals,"  and 
Gueneau  de  Montbeillard  (1720-99),  who  wrote  a  "History 
of  Birds."  Adanson  (1727-1806)  deserves  also  special 
mention  as  a  botanist ;  he  remained  five  years  in  Senegal  that 
he  might  there  study  natural  history. 

Mineralogy  was  created  by  the  Abbe  Haiiy  (1743-1822), 
who  nevertheless  built  upon  the  admirable  labors  of  the 
Saxon  Werner,  and  was  developed  by  Dolomieu  (1750- 
1801),  who  on  foot  traversed  the  greater  part  of  Europe  to 
prosecute  his  observations. 

In  medicine  and  surgery  we  shall  enumerate  only  the 
names  of  Bordeu  (1722-66),  who  was  opposed  to  the  ideas 
of  Boerhaave,  and  who  attributed  to  every  organ  a  sensi- 
bility peculiar  to  itself;  of  Parmentier  (1737-1816),  who 
popularized  the  cultivation  of  the  potato  in  France,  and  ren- 
dered numerous  services  to  the  popular  food  supply;  of  Des- 
sault  (1744-1805),  one  of  the  founders  of  surgical  anatomy 
and  the  master  of  Bichat ;  of  Pinel,  who  showed  that  the 
insane  were  not  dangerous  creatures  who  must  be  chained, 
but  diseased  persons  who  might  be  cured;  of  the  Abbe  de 
1'Epee,  who  in  his  Institution  for  Deaf  Mutes  corrected  one 
of  the  errors  of  Nature  (1778);  of  Valentin  Haiiy,  who 
mitigated  another  by  founding  the  Institute  of  the  Blind. 
We  must  also  mention  several  Italians:  Vallisneri  (1661- 
1730),  who  made  numerous  experiments  in  entomology  and 
human  organology,  and  combated  the  doctrine  of  spon- 
taneous generation;  Spallanzani  (1719-99),  celebrated  for 
his  valuable  researches  upon  the  circulation  of  the  blood, 
digestion,  and  microscopic  animals;  Morgagni  (1682-1771), 
one  of  the  masters  of  anatomical  science.  Finally,  we  must 
speak  too  of  the  Englishman  Jenner,  who  in  1775  discovered 


CHAP.  XXIX.]       SCIENCES  AND  LETTERS.  477 

vaccination,  and  of  Cheselden  (1688-1752),  who  made  the 
first  operation  for  cataract  upon  a  person  born  blind. 

The  geographical  discoveries  of  the  eighteenth  century 
had  not  the  same  motive  as  those  of  the  early  days  of  the 
modern  era.  The  underlying  principle  of  the  latter  had 
been  the  love  of  gain  or  religious  sentiment.  The  explora- 
tions of  the  eighteenth  century  had  above  all  a  scientific 
aim.  Columbus  had  discovered  the  new  continent,  Gama 
the  route  to  the  Indies;  Magellan  had  made  the  circuit  of 
the  globe;  in  the  seventeenth  century  the  Dutch  had  landed 
at  New  Zealand  (1606)  and  at  Van  Diemen's  Land  (1642) 
and  the  German  Kaempfer  at  Japan  (1683).  After  them 
nothing  could  be  gleaned.  But  if  there  was  little  hope  of 
meeting  with  new  continents,  still  it  remained  to  be  demon- 
strated that  beyond  certain  latitudes  our  globe  is  uninhabit- 
able. Such  was  the  result  of  the  three  voyages  of  Dampier 
around  the  world  (1673-1711),  of  those  of  Anson  (1740), 
Byron  (1765),  Wallis  and  Carteret  (1766),  and  especially  of 
Captain  Cook.  This  great  mariner,  who  owed  his  knowledge 
only  to  himself,  had  commenced  his  reputation  by  tracing 
as  early  as  1759  a  map  of  the  St.  Lawrence,  which  has  not 
been  surpassed.  In  his  first  voyage  around  the  globe  he 
visited  Tahiti,  made  the  circuit  of  New  Zealand,  and  coasted 
along  the  shores  of  Australia  (1768-71).  Less  fortunate 
than  the  French  Bougainville,  his  rival  in  glory,  who  had 
just  discovered  the  Society  Islands,  the  Dangerous  Archi- 
pelago, and  the  island  of  Bougainville  (1766-67),  Cook 
like  Magellan  was  assassinated,  but  by  the  natives  of 
Oceanica  (1779).  His  death  has  rendered  celebrated  the 
Bay  of  Karakakoua  in  the  Sandwich  Islands.  On  the  track 
of  Cook  and  Bougainville,  La  Perouse  (1785)  and  d'Entre- 
casteaux  (1791)  traversed  in  every  direction  the  perilous 
labyrinth  of  islands  and  archipelagoes  which  to-day  forms 
the  fifth  part  of  the  world.  They  have  rendered  the  Great 
Ocean  almost  as  well  known  as  the  European  seas.  But  those 
voyages  were  even  less  serviceable  to  geography  than  to  the 
general  physical  knowledge  of  the  globe,  to  astronomy  and 
natural  history.  It  would  be  impossible  to  recapitulate  all 
the  curious  observations,  the  interesting  facts,  and  the  useful 
indications  they  have  contributed  to  science.  La  Perouse 
perished  in  his  task.  In  1827  the  last  vestiges  of  his  ship- 
wreck were  found  near  the  Vanikoro  Islands.  Bass  and 
Flinders  made  in  1798  the  circuit  of  Tasmania;  Bering 


478  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.         [BOOK  VII. 

had  discovered  in  1728  the  strait  which  bears  his  name; 
and  in  1711  the  French  Kerguelen  traversed  the  southern 
seas. 

While  the  physicists  were  laying  bare  new  forces,  and  the 
navigators  new  lands,  the  writers  for  their  part  were  dis- 
covering a  new  world. 

Letters    and  T  •.  j       •         .,  j- 

arts.  Literature  was  not,  as  during  the  preceding 

century,  confined  mainly  to  the  artificial;  it 
had  invaded  all  and  claimed  to  regulate  all.  The  most  virile 
forces  of  French  intellect  seemed  directed  toward  the  pur- 
suit of  the  public  welfare.  Men  labored  no  longer  to  write 
fine  verses  but  to  sharpen  pointed  maxims.  They  no  longer 
painted  the  oddities  of  society  in  order  to  find  themes  of 
ridicule  but  to  transform  society  itself.  Literature  became 
a  weapon  which  each,  the  headstrong  as  well  as  the  skillful, 
wished  to  wield,  and  which,  ceaselessly  striking  in  every 
direction,  caused  terrible  and  incurable  wounds.  Through 
a  strange  inconsistency,  those  who  had  the  most  to  suffer 
from  this  invasion  of  literary  people  into  politics  were  the 
very  ones  who  most  applauded.  The  society  of  the  eigh- 
teenth century,  frivolous,  sensual,  selfish,  preserved  in  the 
midst  of  its  vices  reverence  for  intellectual  things.  Never 
were  the  drawing  rooms  so  animated,  politeness  so  exquisite, 
conversation  so  brilliant.  There  talent  almost  held  the 
place  of  birth,  and  the  nobility,  with  a  chivalrous  rashness 
which  recalls  that  of  Fontenoy,  endured  with  a  smile  upon 
their  lips  the  fire  of  those  glowing  polemics  which  sons 
of  the  burgesses  aimed  against  them.  "Then,"  says 
Malesherbes,  "a  lofty  enthusiasm  had  taken  possession  of 
all  minds." 

Three  men  were  at  the  head  of  the  movement — Voltaire, 
Montesquieu,  and  Rousseau.  The  former,  whose  real 
name  was  Arouet,  was  born  at  Paris  in  1694.  His  father  was 
a  former  notary  originally  from  Poitou.  He  saw  only  the 
disastrous  years  of  the  great  king,  and  was  one  of  the  most 
ardent  in  the  reaction  which  burst  forth  against  the  religious 
customs  of  the  last  reign.  When  twenty-one  years  old  he 
was  sent  to  the  Bastille  on  account  of  a  satire  against  Louis 
XIV.,  which  he  had  not  made;  already  he  was  paying  the 
penalty  for  his  reputation  of  wit  and  malice.  Entering 
upon  his  career  with  his  tragedy  of  "(Edipus,"  full  of  menac- 
ing verses  (1718),  and  with  the  "Henriade,"  a  defense  of 
religious  toleration  (1723),  he  speedily  attained  renown  and 


CHAP.  XXIX.J       SCIENCES  AND  LETTERS.  479 

was  everywhere  sought  for.  One  day,  however,  he  felt  the 
inconveniences  of  that  high  aristocratic  society  into  the 
midst  of  which  he  had  been  early  introduced,  and  in  which 
his  light  and  brilliant  mind,  his  fine  and  delicate  tempera- 
ment, took  its  ease.  A  Chevalier  de  Rohan-Chabot,  having 
spoken  of  him  with  impertinence,  had  been  forthwith  chas- 
tised by  one  of  those  winged  words  which  Voltaire  shot  off 
so  well.  He  took  revenge,  like  a  cowardly  and  brutal  great 
lord,  by  the  hand  of  his  lackeys.  Voltaire,  who  had  no 
lackey,  demanded  reparation.  The  nobleman  by  another 
dastardly  act  obtained  from  the  minister  the  confinement  in 
the  Bastille  of  the  impertinent  plebeian  who  dared  to  pro- 
voke a  haughty  aristocrat.  Soon  set  free,  but  on  condition 
of  going  abroad,  Voltaire  went  to  England  "to  learn  how 
to  think."  He  remained  there  three  years;  he  brought 
back  the  ideas  of  Locke,  Newton,  and  Shahspere  with  a  much 
more  ardent  worship  of  free  thought  and  free  church 
than  of  political  liberty.  On  his  return  his  plays  "Brutus" 
and  "The  Death  of  Caesar"  introduced  upon  the  French 
stage  a  reflection  of  the  grand  English  tragedian,  while  his 
English  "Letters"  popularized  the  ideas  of  the  wise  philos- 
opher and  the  great  astronomer.  This,  however,  was  not 
without  persecution.  The  latter  work  was  burned  by  the 
hand  of  the  headsman. 

Voltaire,  who  owed  two  of  his  masterpieces,  "Zaire"  and 
"Tancrede,"  to  Christian  sentiment,  desperately  attacked 
the  Church;  his  earliest  and  most  constant  efforts  were 
directed  much  more  against  that  spiritual  power  which  pre- 
vented thought  than  against  civil  authority,  which  prevented 
only  action.  For  this  war  he  allied  himself  with  the  sover- 
eigns and  sought  their  protection.  He  was  in  correspond- 
ence with  the  great  Catherine  of  Russia  and  with  many  Ger- 
man princes.  He  sojourned  at  the  court  of  Frederick  II., 
a  skeptical  and  lettered  prince,  whose  French  verses  he 
corrected  and  with  whom  he  finally  quarreled.  He  then 
established  himself  at  the  extremity  of  France  on  the  very 
frontier,  so  that  at  the  least  indication  of  peril  he  might 
escape  to  Ferney  near  Geneva.  Thence  there  issued, 
carried  by  every  wind,  light  poems,  epistles,  tragedies, 
romances,  historical,  scientific,  and  philosophical  works, 
which  in  a  few  days  made  the  tour  of  Europe. 

Growing  old  with  the  century,  he  turned  like  it  to  more 
serious  thoughts.  The  evil  condition  of  society  became,  as 


480  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

it  were,  his  personal  enemy  and  love  of  justice  his  most 
ardent  passion.  He  assisted  and  defended  the  victims  of 
deplorable  judicial  errors;  without  rest  he  denounced  the 
numerous  faults  of  legislation,  of  jurisprudence,  and  of  pub- 
lic administration.  All  the  reforms  he  solicited  in  the  civil 
order  were  accomplished  after  him.  He  exercised  in  some 
degree  during  fifty  years  the  intellectual  government  of 
Europe.  He  justly  merited  the  hatred  of  those  who  believe 
that  the  world  should  remain  un progressive  and  the  admi- 
ration of  those  who  look  upon  society  as  obliged  to  labor 
without  cessation  for  its  material  and  moral  improvement. 

President  de  Montesquieu  (1689-1755),  of  calmer  and 
graver  mind,  though  author  of  the  "Persian  Letters,"  a 
satire  profound  and  formidable  while  seeming  trivial  (1721), 
passed  twenty  years  in  composing  a  single  book,  the 
"Spirit  of  Laws,"  but  it  was  an  imperishable  monument 
he  was  rearing.  "The  human  race  had  lost  its  title  deeds," 
said  Voltaire;  "de  Montesquieu  has  just  refound  them." 
Montesquieu  searched  for  and  gave  the  reason  of  civil  and 
political  laws;  he  set  forth  the  nature  of  governments;  and 
though  he  condemned  none,  though  changes  annoyed  him, 
his  preferences  were  nevertheless  most  evident,  and  it  was 
English  liberty  which  he  offered  to  the  admiration  of 
France.  When  he  visited  Great  Britain  in  1729  he  wrote: 
"At  London,  liberty  and  equality!"  He  was  half  mistaken 
as  to  England;  but  sixty  years  before  1789  he  suggested 
the  motto  of  the  Revolution. 

Rousseau,  son  of  a  Genevan  watchmaker  (1712-78),  com- 
menced to  write  only  at  the  middle  of  a  life  already  long, 
crowded  full  with  faults,  miseries,  and  contradictions. 
When  thirty-eight  years  old  he  composed  his  first  "Dis- 
course against  the  Sciences  and  the  Arts."  It  was  a  decla- 
ration of  war  against  civilization  ;  his  second  work  upon  the 
"Origin  of  Inequality  among  Men"  was  another  against  the 
entire  social  order.  In  "Emile"  he  outlined  a  chimerical 
plan  of  education;  in  the  "Social  Contract"  he  proclaimed 
the  principle  of  national  sovereignty  and  universal  suffrage, 
placing  great  truths  and  great  errors  side  by  side,  but  always 
expressing  both  with  peculiar  eloquence. 

The  eighteenth  century,  at  once  so  old  and  so  young,  had 
many  conventional  sentiments;  it  understood  of  the  human 
heart  only  the  emotions  of  pleasure,  and  of  nature  only 
operatic  and  boudoir  decorations  and  the  yew  trees  of  Ver- 


CHAP.  XXIX.]       SCfEATCES  A.\'D  LETTERS.  481 

sailles.  To  this  frivolous  society  Rousseau  gave  a  vigorous 
shock  which  brought  it  back  to  natural  sentiments;  in  his 
"Nouvelle  Heloise"  he  opened  its  eyes  upon  real  nature 
and  genuine  passions;  he  created  the  poetry  on  which  the 
nineteenth  century  has  lived. 

Considering  only  the  political  point  of  view,  we  may  say 
that  the  influence  of  these  three  men  was  going  to  be  again 
encountered  in  the  three  main  epochs  of  the  Revolution: 
that  of  Voltaire  in  the  universal  glow  of  1789,  that  of  Mon- 
tesquieu in  the  efforts  of  the  constitutionalists  of  the 
National  Assembly,  that  of  Rousseau  in  the  thought,  if  not 
in  the  acts,  of  the  ferocious  dreamers  of  the  Convention. 

Near  those  great  writers,  in  a  less  agitated  but  sometimes 
higher  region,  Buff  on  abode,  an  intellect  serene  and  majestic, 
like  that  very  nature  of  which  he  was  the  peerless  painter. 

Behind  the  leaders  were  the  soldiers:  Diderot,  a  stormy 
and  unequal  writer,  and  d'Alembert,  an  able  geometrician 
who  endeavored  to  organize  the  army  of  philosophers. 
They  founded  the  Encyclopedia,  the  first  volume  of  which 
appeared  in  1751.  This  was  an  immense  review  of  all 
human  attainments,  which  were  in  it  exposed  in  a  new 
fashion,  that  was  often  menacing  for  social  order  and  always 
hostile  to  religion.  Pretentious  declaimers  went  farther  still : 
Helvetius  in  his  book  on  the  "Mind,"  Baron  d'Holbach 
in  his  "System  of  Nature,"  Lamettrie  in  his  "Human 
Machine,"  Abbe  Raynal  in  his  "Philosophical  History  of 
the  Two  Indies." 

But  a  place  apart  must  be  left  for  the  Chancellor  d'Agues- 
seau,  whose  elegant  ordinances  of  reform  constitute  the 
Code  Louis  XV. ;  for  the  moralist  Vauvenargues,  who 
wrote  this  line:  "The  great  thoughts  come  from  the  heart"; 
for  the  Abbe  de  Condillac,  a  powerful  analyst;  for  his 
brother,  the  Abbe  de  Mably,  a  bold  publicist;  finally,  for 
the  Marquis  de  Condorcet,  who,  condemned  later  with  the 
Girondists,  composed  while  waiting  for  death  an  "Outline 
of  the  Progress  of  the  Human  Mind,"  and  who  was  wont 
to  see  humanity  as  a  tireless  traveler  advancing  each  day 
stronger,  happier,  and  freer  on  the  route  which  God  had 
shown. 

The  philosophers  attacked  everything;  the  economists 
claimed  to  touch  only  material  interests.  In  the  seventeenth 
century  it  was  believed  that  a  nation  was  rich  according 
as  it  bought  less  and  sold  more.  Quesnay  demonstrated 


482  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

that  the  precious  metals  are  the  sign  of  riches,  but  not  riches 
themselves;  true  wealth  he  found  in  agriculture.  Gournay 
sought  it  in  manufactures.  The  theory  of  the  Scotchman 
Adam  Smith,  who  lived  long  in  France,  was  more  com- 
prehensive; according  to  him  wealth  existed  in  labor, 
and  labor  had  three  modes  of  application-;  agriculture, 
manufactures,  and  commerce.  His  pupils  recognized  a 
fourth:  intellectual  labor,  or  the  arts,  letters,  and  sciences. 

Thus  human  thought,  long  imprisoned  in  purely  meta- 
physical speculations,  or  limited  to  the  unselfish  adoration 
of  the  Muses,  now  sought  to  solve  the  most  difficult  prob- 
lems which  interest  human  society.  And  all,  philosophers 
like  economists,  found  the  solution  on  the  side  of  liberty. 
From  the  school  of  Quesnay  issued  the  celebrated  axiom, 
"Let  things  alone,"  which  found  application  when  the  edicts 
of  1754  and  1764  recognized  freedom  in  the  grain  trade,  and 
which  Turgot  was  anew  to  proclaim.  The  Marquis 
d'Argenson  had  said  the  same  thing  under  another  form, 
"Do  not  govern  too  much." 

There  are  two  sides  to  be  observed  in  the  literature  of 
the  eighteenth  century,  one  serious,  the  other  frivolous. 
The  arts  possessed  only  the  latter.  Exclusive  search  after 
grace  caused  the  beauty  of  lines  and  types  to  be  forgotten. 
Charming  works  were  produced;  the  mansions  of  the  rich 
were  decorated  with  light  and  coquettish  elegance;  but  not 
a  single  grand  statue  was  sculptured  or  a  grand  picture 
painted.  So  Versailles  was  deserted  for  boudoirs,  and  the 
architects  reduced  their  plans  to  the  modest  proportions  of 
a  society  which  knew  not  how  to  carry  the  lofty  air  of  the 
preceding  age. 

Ange  Gabriel,  who  died  in  1772,  erected  the  t\vo  charm- 
ing colonnades  of  the  Place  de  la  Concorde,  drawing  his 
inspiration  from  the  colonnade  of  the  Louvre;  also  the 
Military  School,  a  pretty  edifice,  which  is  belittled  by  the 
immensity  of  the  Champ  de  Mars,  and  the  theater  of  Ver- 
sailles and  the  castle  of  Compiegne;  Robert  de  Cotte 
(I735)>  the  colonnade  of  Trianon;  Soufflot  (1781), 
the  Pantheon;  Servandoni  (1766),  the  portal  of  St.  Sul- 
pice,  which  is  too  highly  lauded,  destitute  as  it  is  of  that 
simple  grandeur  which  marks  the  portal  of  the  Pantheon; 
Antoine,  the  heavy  edifice  of  the  Mint..  The  sculptors 
have  left  even  less.  They  are  G.  Coustou  (1745);  Pigalle 
(1785),  by  whom  are  the  statue  of  Voltaire  at  the  Institute, 


CHAP.  XXIX.]       SCIENCES  AND  LETTERS.  483 

and  the  tomb  of  Marshal  Saxe  at  Strasburg;  Bouchardon 
(1762),  several  statues  at  St.  Sulpice  and  the  cumbrous 
fountain  of  Rue  de  Crenelle.  The  painters  had  more 
merit,  especially  Watteau  (1721),  although  he  represented 
only  conventional  art  with  his  operatic  shepherdesses;  Carle 
Vanloo  (1760),  whose  ".^Eneas  Carrying  Anchises"  is  greatly 
praised,  and  J.  Vernet  (1789)  famed  for  sea  pieces.  But 
Boucher  (1770),  whom  his  contemporaries  did  not  scruple  to 
call  the  French  Raphael,  is  deservedly  forgotten,  as  are  his 
figures  "fed  on  roses."  Greuze  (1726-1805)  deserves  a 
place  of  his  own  on  account  of  the  simple  and  graceful 
artlessness  of  his  painting.  Some  of  his  pictures  will  in 
all  ages  continue  masterpieces.  They  are  the  "Village 
Bride,"  the  "Paralytic  Father,"  the  "Good  Mother,"  the 
"Little  Girl  with  the  Dog." 

Rameau  (1764)  created  a  revolution  in  music. 


CHAPTER  XXX. 
ATTEMPTS   AT   REFORM. 


Disagreement  between  Ideas  and  Institutions. — Agitation  of  Mind 
and  Demands  for  Reforms. — Reforms  Accomplished  by  the  Govern- 
ments.— Last  Years  of  Louis  XV.  (1763-74). — Political  and 
Military  Decline  of  France. — Attempt  at  and  then  Abandonment  of 
Reforms  under  Louis  XVI.  (1774-93). 


THE  movement  which  took  possession  of  the  human  mind 

is  the  most  striking  spectacle  presented  by  the  eighteenth 

_..  .    century.       The  sixteenth   century  had  been 

Disagreement         .  /•        1-1  »          •         i        T      •       i 

between  ideas  witness  of  a  like  outburst,  but  in  the  limited 
and  institutions.  sphere  of  religiOUs  ideas.  Men  no  longer 
occupied  themselves  with  dogmas ;  they  no  longer  devoted 
all  their  thought,  as  at  the  time  of  Luther  and  Calvin,  to 
questions  of  grace  and  free  will.  Men  sought  for  their 
rights  and  their  duties.  The  spirit  of  examination,  invol- 
untarily inaugurated  by  Luther  and  Calvin,  really  made 
victorious,  strengthened,  and  extended  by  Descartes  and 
Voltaire,  by  science  and  literature,  was  breaking  its  last 
chains.  Never  had  been  seen  a  curiosity  so  keen  upon 
every  subject  and  an  audacity  so  great  in  venturing  out  of 
traveled  paths.  During  years  consolation  had  been  sought 
for  an  abuse  in  an  epigram  and  for  an  iniquity  in  a  song. 
"They  sing,  therefore  they  will  pay,"  said  Mazarin.  But 
already  there  was  less  singing;  the  mind  became  more 
serious  and  more  formidable  in  its  scope.  Confronting 
a  royalty  that  seemed  to  take  pleasure  in  its  degradation,  a 
nobility  that  no  longer  knew  how  to  furnish  generals,  and  a 
clergy  in  which  were  found  no  more  Bossuets  or  Fenelons, 
men  questioned  the  rights  and  investigated  the  titles  of 
those  powers  formerly  so  revered. 

The  principal  work  of  royalty  in  modern  society  had  been 
to  found  the  unity  of  territory  and  the  unity  of  control  by 

484 


ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  485 

overthrowing  feudalism,  which  erected  every  fief  into  a  state, 
and  which  gave  a  thousand  chiefs  to  each  of  the  European 
nations.  That  struggle,  which  commenced  in  France  in  the 
twelfth  century,  was  completed  in  the  seventeenth  by  Riche- 
lieu and  Louis  XIV.  But  the  ground  was  covered  with  the 
debris  of  conquered  feudalism.  Everywhere  among  indi- 
viduals and  among  institutions  existed  the  most  shocking 
inequalities  and  the  most  strange  confusion.  Let  us  picture 
the  spectacle  in  France.  At  the  same  time  to  approximate 
the  truth  we  must  remember  that  abuses  were  still  greater 
in  absolutist  Europe. 

I.   Political  condition. 

The  constitution  not  being  written,  everything  reposed 
on  usage  and  was  only  a  matter  of  opinion,  consequently 
variable  just  like  the  opinion  which  had  ceaselessly  varied. 
Royalty  was  in  theory  an  absolute  power.  This,  however, 
it  never  was  in  fact,  for  it  was  opposed  by  numerous  and 
powerful  interests,  traditions,  and  precedents,  erected  into 
fundamental  laws;  so  that  personal  right  being  vaguely 
denned,  and  political  customs  being  still  more  defective  than 
the  institutions,  all  sought  to  encroach  on  the  domain  of 
each  and  none  was  kept  in  its  place.  The  ministers  at  need 
laid  their  hand  upon  justice  as  the  parliaments  did  upon 
law,  in  order  to  violate  both.  A  royal  edict  was  to  be  exe- 
cuted only  after  having  been  registered  by  Parliament,  but 
the  Council  of  State  issued  commandatory  decrees  which 
did  not  require  that  formality.  The  clergy  and  the  nobility 
had  their  tribunals;  the  third  estate  exercised  public  func- 
tions which  it  had  bought  for  cash;  and  as  to  the  greater 
number  of  offices,  the  king  was  stripped  of  one  of  his  most 
important  prerogatives,  the  right  of  summoning  the  most 
capable  and  the  best  to  the  service  of  the  state. 

There  were  six  ministers:  the  Chancellor  or  Chief  Jus- 
tice, who  possessed  hardly  more  than  a  title,  since  he  did  not 
hold  the  seals,  the  Controller  General  of  Finance,  and  the 
four  state  secretaries  of  the  Royal  Mansion,  War,  Navy, 
and  Foreign  Affairs.  These  ministries  presented  the  most 
peculiar  confusion  of  responsibilities,  and  furthermore  they 
geographically  divided  the  kingdom  among  themselves. 
Thus  the  provincial  governors  and  lieutenant  governors  did 
not  depend  upon  the  Minister  of  War,  but  the  Post  Office  was 
in  his  department,  as  were  Dauphine  and  all  the  territories 
conquered  since  1552.  The  Minister  of  the  Navy  was  at 


486  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

the  same  time  Minister  of  Maritime  Commerce  and  had 
under  his  control  the  consulates  and  the  Chamber  of  Com- 
merce of  Marseilles.  The  Minister  of  Foreign  Affairs  regu- 
lated the  pensions  and  administered  the  provinces  of  Guy- 
enne,  Normandy,  Champagne,  and  Berry.  The  Minister 
of  the  Royal  Mansion  had  under  him  ecclesiastical  affairs 
and  the  lettres  de  cachet*  together  with  Languedoc,  Paris, 
Provence,  Brittany,  and  Navarre.  Among  the  responsibili- 
ties of  the  controller  general  were  bridges  and  highways, 
hospitals,  prisons,  epidemics,  commerce  by  land,  and  agri- 
culture. As  to  administrative  divisions,  there  were  as  many 
as  there  were  different  administrations.  The  limits  of  the 
34  intendancies,  of  the  25  financial  divisions,  of  the  40 
governments  or  provinces,  of  the  135  archbishoprics  and 
bishoprics  or  dioceses,  of  the  17  parliaments  and  sovereign 
councils  or  jurisdictions,  of  the  22  universities,  and  the  like, 
constantly  encroached  upon  each  other. 

One  of  the  most  deplorable  principles  of  administration 
was  to  obtain  money  by  the  creation  of  useless  offices  which 
burdened  the  public.  "Pontchartrain,"  said  St.  Simon, 
"in  eight  years  furnished  as  much  as  150,000,000  francs  by 
only  parchment  and  wax. "  He  had  appointed  hereditary 
criers  of  interments,  tasters  of  Parisian  beers,  controllers  of 
wigs,  and  a  thousand  like  officers.  This  abuse  had  another 
and  a  peculiar  effect:  the  number  of  office  holders  greatly 
exceeding  the  needs  of  the  service,  these  officers  served 
only  in  turn.  Thus  in  the  court  of  justice  for  the  salt 
taxf  at  Paris  the  officers  alternated  every  year.  A  clerk  of 
the  courts  exercised  his  functions  only  each  third  year. 

Thirteen  parliaments  and  four  provincial  councils  pro- 
nounced in  sovereign  capacity  upon  civil  and  criminal  mat- 
ters. More  than  300  bailiffs'  or  seneschals'  courts  judged  in 
first  instance.  They  had  the  public  ministry,  with  which  the 


*  The  lettres  de  cachet  were  sealed  letters  containing  some  order  from 
the  king.  Exile  or  imprisonment,  without  accusation  or  time  limit, 
was  often  inflicted  by  them,  and  they  were  considered  the  most  odious 
violation  of  personal  liberty.  It  is  stated  that  during  the  reign  of  Louis 
XV.  150,000  of  these  infamous  orders  were  issued. — ED. 

f  Seventeen  such  tribunals — that  of  Paris  being  the  most  important — 
were  established  in  different  cities  of  the  kingdom,  occupied  exclusively 
with  investigating  and  judging  violations  of  the  laws  concerning  the 
gabeile,  or  salt  tax.  These  laws  were  minute  and  vexatious  almost 
beyond  description. — ED. 


CHAP.  XXX.]         ATTEMPTS  A  7^  REFORM.  487 

ancients  were  unacquainted,  but  there  was  no  justice  of  the 
peace,  an  officer  whom  the  Revolution  introduced.  The 
parliaments  had  very  unequal  jurisdictions.  That  of  the 
parliament  of  Paris  included  two-fifths  of  France.  Besides, 
there  were  military  and  commercial,  seignorial  and  ecclesi- 
astical tribunals.  Those  of  the  cities  had  only  a  local 
police  jurisdiction.  However,  the  senate  of  Strasburg  could 
condemn  to  death.  As  to  the  spiritual  judges  of  the  "offi- 
cialties"  or  church  courts,  they  could  inflict  perpetual 
imprisonment,  and  sometimes  the  high  lord  justiciary,  in 
order  to  assert  his  rights,  "would  hang  a  man  who  deserved 
banishment."  The  courts  of  aids  or  of  appeals,  cham- 
bers of  accounts  or  financial  courts,  and  the  coinage  courts 
of  appeal  controlled  all  trials  relative  to  imposts,  coinage, 
and  questions  of  gold  and  silver.  The  Grand  Council,  the 
Council  of  the  Royal  Mansion,  the  Tribunal  of  the  Univer- 
sity of  Paris,  the  royal  captainries,  and  the  like  had  a 
special  jurisdiction.  Certain  individuals  could  be  tried  only 
by  certain  tribunals. 

The  civil  law  consecrated  many  acts  of  injustice,  but  the 
penal  law  ordered  torture  before  decision,  and  with  frightful 
facility  lavished  mutilations,  death,  and  the  most  atrocious 
punishments  without  allowing  the  accused  a  defender  to 
make  his  plea,  without  permitting  any  opposing  argument, 
without  even  requiring  of  the  judge  that  he  give  a  reason 
for  his  decision.  In  1766,  because  a  wooden  cross  had  been 
broken  to  pieces  on  the  bridge  of  Abbeville,  a  young  man 
of  nineteen,  the  Chevalier  de  la  Barre,  was  sentenced, 
though  his  guilt  had  not  been  proved,  to  be  burned  alive  after 
having  had  his  tongue  and  his  hand  cut  off;  four  others 
condemned  to  the  same  punishment  escaped  by  flight. 
Legal  proceedings,  slow,  complicated,  carried  on  in  dark- 
ness and  silence,  sought  less  for  truth  than  for  a  culprit ; 
and  in  advance  considering  the  accused  condemned,  often 
struck  the  innocent.  In  1770  Montbailly  was  broken  on 
the  wheel  at  St.  Omer  for  a  crime  of  which  the  Superior 
Council  of  Artois  and  all  France  three  months  after  declared 
him  not  guilty.  In  vain  had  Voltaire  made  France  and 
Europe  resound  with  his  eloquent  protests,  against  lamen- 
table judicial  errors;  in  vain  had  the  work  of  Beccaria 
pointed  out  the  true  principles  of  criminal  legislation;  in 
vain  decrees  of  the  Court  of  Appeals,  each  day  more  fre- 
quent, gave  warning  to  the  judges:  Parliament  rejected  all 


THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.         [BOOK  VII. 

reform,  and  in  1785  President  Dupaty  had  to  exercise  equal 
perseverance  and  courage  to  save  from  the  wheel  three  men 
unjustly  condemned.  The  magistracy,  if  upright  and 
enlightened,  was  better  than  the  law.  But  the  law  was  such 
that  it  exposed  the  most  conscientious  judge  to  error  and 
inevitably  caused  the  accused  to  tremble  even  though  inno- 
cent. "If  I  were  accused  of  having  stolen  the  towers  of  Notre 
Dame,"  said  some  distinguished  person  of  that  time,  "  I 
should  judge  it  prudent  to  run  away."  On  the  other  hand, 
society  was  so  encumbered  by  so  many  still  existing  relics 
of  the  Middle  Ages  that  there  were  even  found  in  it  cus- 
toms handed  down  from  Merovingian  days.  Thus  even  at 
Paris  the  right  of  asylum  was  enjoyed  by  the  inclosure  of 
the  Temple. 

The  nobles  no  longer  formed  conspiracies;  extraordi- 
nary commissions  were  no  longer  seen  as  formerly  rescuing 
the  accused  from  their  natural  judges.  But  still  the  king 
frequently  ordered  imprisonment  or  exile  without  trial  and 
sometimes  without  time  limit;  many  trials  were  stopped  by 
a  bed  of  justice  or  called  up  to  the  Grand  Council,  which 
was  still  another  means  of  avoiding  them. 

The  magistrates,  clerks,  and  officers  of  justice  were  not 
paid  by  the  king  or  were  paid  very  badly;  thus  they  sought 
remuneration  from  the  prosecution  and  defense  at  a  rate 
which  they  themselves  fixed.  As  in  that  most  unequal 
society,  a  privilege,  a  prohibition,  or  an  obscure  regulation 
was  encountered  at  every  step,  the  trials  were  innumerable 
and  endless,  and  the  contesting  parties  were  the  prey  of 
what  a  contemporary,  a  royal  advocate,  did  not  scruple  to 
call  "the  brigandage  of  justice."  These  exactions  annually 
cost  the  parties  in  litigation  44,000,000  francs,  money  of 
to-day,  or  according  to  a  minister  of  Louis  XV.  even 
60,000,000.  The  jurisdiction  of  the  parliament  of  Paris 
reached  in  certain  directions  to  a  distance  of  150  leagues 
from  the  capital — another  cause  of  ruin  to  those  who  were 
compelled  to  travel  exceedingly  far  in  quest  of  a  justice  that 
was  very  slow. 

Credit  is  a  force  that  only  develops  in  states  where  the 
law  is  stronger  than  the  caprices  of  power.  Hence  it  was 
not  found  in  France;  it  even  existed  less  for  the  government 
than  for  individuals.  "One  was  reduced,"  says  Count 
Mollien,  "to  calculate  the  chances  of  a  contract  made  with 
the  ministers  like  those  of  a  very  risky  loan."  The  most 


CHAP.  XXX.]          ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  489 

solemn  promises  having  been  a  hundred  times  violated,  the 
treasury  obtained  advances  only  by  giving  guarantees; 
furthermore  even  under  these  shameful  conditions  it  often 
paid  a  usurious  interest  of  twenty  per  cent,  for  advances 
upon  the  general  revenue.  However,  all  this  time  the  British 
government  was  easily  obtaining  money  at  four  per  cent. 
This  means  that  the  financial  strength  of  England  was  already 
five  times  greater  than  that  of  France.  Now  war  demands 
courage  and  talent,  but  it  also  requires  much  money. 

The  accounts  were  so  badly  kept  that  they  were  audited 
only  ten,  twelve,  and  even  fifteen  years  after  the  expiration 
of  some  transaction  whose  operations  were  to  be  retraced : 
they  were  so  confused  that  no  one,  not  even  the  ministers, 
knew  just  what  the  state  had  to  pay  nor  what  it  had  to 
receive.  In  1726  Fleury  abandoned  to  the  farmers  general 
some  arrears  of  accounts  that  the  treasury  neglected ;  the 
farmers  obtained  from  these  arrears  about  100,000,000 
francs.  On  the  very  eve  of  the  Revolution,  de  Calonne, 
Necker,  and  the  notables  never  could  agree  upon  the  real 
amount  of  the  deficit  and  of  the  public  debt.  Besides,  from 
the  time  of  Francis  I.  the  public  treasury  was  confounded 
with  the  private  purse  of  the  monarch,  so  that  the  king  drew 
by  handfuls  from  the  common  bank  without  any  other 
formality  than  an  order  drawn  upon  the  treasurer  to  pay  the 
sum  indicated  in  the  draft.  Louis  XV.  during  a  single 
year  thus  borrowed  180,000,000  francs  which  were  for  the 
most  part  employed  in  paying  for  his  pleasures  or  his  cour- 
tiers. In  1 769  after  six  years  of  peace  the  expenses  exceeded 
the  revenues  by  100,000,000  francs,  and  certain  revenues 
were  consumed  ten  years  in  advance.  There  were  even 
advances  upon  the  year  1779. 

The  imposts  presented  the  strangest  confusion,  and  the 
government  did  not  itself  enjoy  all  the  receipts.  The 
indirect  imposts  were  given  out  to  companies  of  revenue 
farmers  and  to  sixty  farmers  general,  who  called  them- 
selves the  "pillars  of  the  state,"  and  who  crushed  it  rather 
than  gave  it  support.  On  the  one  hand,  they  made  the 
treasury  pay  a  usurious  interest:  on  the  other  they  swelled 
their  receipts  by  all  possible  means.  Thus  the  product  of 
the  "donative  of  joyous  advent,"  raised  under  Louis  XV., 
was  abandoned  to  them  for  23,000,000  francs;  they  drew 
from  it  more  than  40,000,000.  In  the  space  of  six  years 
farming  the  dues  on  articles  of  consumption  gave  them  a 


49°  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

profit  of  96,000,000  francs.  Thus  there  is  no  reason  for 
astonishment  at  their  scandalous  wealth.  One  of  them, 
Bouret,  squandered  42,000,000.  And  yet  they  were  forced 
to  share  with  the  courtiers,  assuring  them  presents,  that  is 
to  say,  pensions  or  proportional  benefits  from  the  profits. 
Great  lords,  great  ladies,  accepted  these  shameful  gifts. 
Louis  XV.  himself  stretched  out  his  hand;  he  also  was  a 
receiver  of  presents  or  a  silent  partner. 

These  revenue  farmers  had  at  their  disposition  a  code  so 
complicated  that  the  taxpayer  could  not  understand  it,  so 
rigorous  that  for  the  one  act  of  fraud  in  salt  there  were  con- 
stantly 1700  or  1800  persons  in  prison  and  more  than  300 
at  the  galleys.  The  treasury  was  not  more  indulgent:  if  a 
single  receiver  of  taxes  did  not  bring  in  his  receipts  the 
four  principal  taxpayers  of  the  district  were  arrested,  though 
they  owed  nothing  to  the  state,  and  they  were  kept  in  prison 
till  they  had  made  good  the  deficit.  It  was  the  odious 
system  of  Roman  administration  with  the  liability  of  the 
curials. 

The  nominal  effective  military  force  in  time  of  peace  was 
170,000  men,  of  whom  131,000  were  infantry,  31,000  cav- 
alry, and  8000  belonging  to  the  Royal  Mansion,  but  the  real 
effective  force  did  not  reach  140,000  men.  In  this  number 
are  reckoned  12  Swiss  regiments,  8  German,  3  Irish,  and  i 
Swedish.  The  21,000  frontier  guardsmen  hardly  served  in 
time  of  peace,  and  likewise  the  60,000  militia  of  the  provin- 
cial regiments.  The  grades  were  multiplied  beyond  meas- 
ure; there  were  no  less  than  60,000  officers,  either  in  active 
service  or  on  leave;  according  to  a  regulation  01  1772  a  regi- 
ment of  cavalry  of  482  men  should  possess  146  officers  and 
under  officers,  which  made  one  chief  for  less  than  three  men. 
Grades  were  bought,  even  in  the  select  troops,  and  the  pur- 
chasers could  become  general  officers  without  having  ren- 
dered any  military  service.  The  Duke  de  Bouillon  was  a 
colonel  at  eleven  years  of  age,  the  Duke  de  Frousac  at 
seven;  his  major  was  twelve.  Despite  the  reforms  of 
Choiseul  there  was  still  immense  waste  in  the  army  and 
a  bad  system  of  enlistment  vitiated  its  composition.  The 
regular  army  was  recruited  by  volunteer  enlistments  and  the 
militia  by  lot,  which  annually  called  out  10,000  men,  who 
were  bound  to  serve  six  years.  But  the  drawing  by  lot  of 
the  militia,  which  weighed  principally  upon  the  country 
places,  was  marked  by  the  most  scandalous  abuses;  and  if 


CHAP.  XXX.]         ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  491 

the  volunteers  made  good  soldiers,  the  recruiting  agents 
often  sent  to  the  regiments  the  dregs  of  the  great  cities. 
Thus  every  year  there  were  4000  desertions  to  the  enemy. 

The  clergy  was  divided  into  clergy  of  France  in  the 
ancient  provinces  and  foreign  clergy  in  the  territories  con- 
quered subsequent  to  Francis  I.  This  distinction  had 
no  importance  save  as  to  'the  imposts.  But  the  bishoprics 
of  Metz,  Toul,  Verdun,  and  Strasburg,  suffragans  of 
Treves  or  Mayence,  and  the  five  bishoprics  of  Corsica, 
suffragans  of  Pisa  or  Genoa,  took  no  part  in  the  general 
assemblies  of  the  clergy.  The  archbishops  of  Besancon 
and  Cambrai  had,  on  the  contrary,  foreign  suffragans.  The 
dioceses  were  very  unequal:  that  of  Rouen  contained  1338 
parishes;  those  of  Toulon  and  Orange  20.  The  revenues 
were  like  the  dioceses.  The  Bishop  of  Strasburg  had  an 
income  of  500,000  francs;  he  of  Gap,  8000;  and  Fleury 
signed  himself  "Bishop  of  Frejus  through  divine  indigna- 
tion." A  great  number  of  abbes  possessed  an  income 
of  hardly  1000  francs;  the  Abbe  of  Fecamp  could  spend 
120,000,  and  he  of  St.  Germain  three  times  as  much. 
Many  curates  were  very  rich,  but  many  vicars  were  dying 
of  hunger.  Louis  XVI.  deserved  their  gratitude  by  fixing 
their  minimum  allowance  from  the  tithes  at  350  francs. 
The  king  appointed  to  all  positions  of  any  importance  in 
the  Church;  the  bishops,  the  chapters,  and  the  lay  lords 
appointed  to  the  rest.  To  recapitulate,  12,000  bishops, 
abbes,  priors,  and  canons  divided  among  themselves  more 
than  40,000,000  francs,  about  one-third  of  the  revenues  of 
the  church ;  eight  times  as  many  priests  and  religious  per- 
sons had  to  be  content  with  the  two-thirds  remaining.  I 
am  not  speaking  at  all  of  the  petty  abbes  who  belonged 
neither  to  the  world  nor  the  Church,  and  who  scandalized 
both. 

II.  Social  condition. 

Instead  of  one  single  law  there  were  384  different  cus- 
toms; hence  it  might  happen  that  what  was  legal  in  one 
province  was  illegal  in  another.  Since  each  parliament  had 
its  peculiar  regulations,  the  diversity  of  legislation  was  still 
further  increased  by  diversity  of  jurisprudence. 

The  three  orders  of  the  state,  the  clergy,  the  nobility, 
and  the  lower  order,  were  distinguished  by  privileges  or 
duties  which  made  of  the  French  people  three  different 
nations,  each  having  its  own  hierarchy  and  its  distinct 


492  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

classes.  Thus  there  was  the  great  and  the  petty  nobility, 
the  former  living  at  the  court  and  on  the  state,  the  latter 
in  the  province  and  upon  its  own  scanty  revenues;  the 
upper  and  the  lower  clergy,  the  one  very  rich,  the  other 
very  poor.  In  the  third  estate  there  were  50,000  families 
possessing  judicial  offices  by  hereditary  claim,  who  formed 
a  real  aristocracy  and  did  not  associate  with  the  financiers; 
the  burgess  disdained  the  artisan;  and  the  peasant,  at  the 
bottom  of  the  ladder,  endured  with  wrath  all  the  weight  of  a 
society  which  crushed  him.  In  the  family  there  were  ine- 
qualities, since  the  right  of  primogeniture  left  to  the  younger 
sons  only  their  sword  or  the  Church,  and  to  many  of  the 
daughters  only  the  convent.  Below  the  three  orders  were 
the  serfs,  the  Protestants,  who  had  no  civil  status,  and  the 
Jews. 

As  to  the  provinces,  some,  "state  territories, "  as  Langue- 
doc,  Burgundy,  Brittany,  and  Artois,  had  a  shadow  of 
liberty  for  the  conduct  of  their  affairs,  and  hence  were  in 
a  better  situation;  the  others,  "elect  territories,"  knew 
only  the  absolute  commands  of  the  court;  finally,  the  latter 
paid  imposts  which  the  former  did  not  pay  or  paid  in  less 
proportion.  Some,  as  Lorraine,  the  Three  Bishoprics,  and 
Alsace,  had  no  customhouses  between  them  and  foreign 
countries;  others  were  surrounded  by  customhouses  in 
every  direction.  In  1789  the  provinces  of  southern  France 
were  separated  from  each  other  as  from  foreign  countries 
by  customhouses  along  their  boundaries.  The  same 
measure  of  salt  was  to  be  paid  for,  here  6  francs,  and 
there  62.  The  impost  of  the  twentieth*  was  less  heavy 
in  Lorraine,  Alsace,  and  Franche  Comte  than  in  the  other 
provinces ;  Lorraine  was  not  even  subjected  to  the  capita- 
tion tax;  so  that  old  France  found  itself  more  burdened 
than  new  France  which  it  had  conquered.  I  am  not  speak- 
ing here  of  the  privileges  of  localities,  corporations,  and 
individuals.  In  Paris  in  1783  the  administrators  of  the 
H6tel  des  Invalides,  of  the  Military  School,  of  the  Bastille 

*  The  twentieth  was  originally  a  feudal  tax,  giving  the  lord  one- 
twentieth  of  the  entire  harvest  or  of  certain  crops  produced  on  his  lands. 
It  was  designed  to  provide  for  the  expenses  of  fortification,  and  payment 
exempted  the  vassal  from  hand  labor  thereon.  It  varied  in  amount 
according  as  the  lord  was  able  to  exact  less  or  more.  So  the  tithe,  nomi- 
nally one-tenth  paid  to  the  government,  varied  in  just  the  same  way 
according  to  the  ability  of  the  taxgatherer. — ED. 


CHAP.  XXX.]         ATTEMPl^S  AT  REFORM.  493 

and  various  religious  communities  paid  no  internal  customs 
duties.  From  this  sprang  up  a  multitude  of  abuses;  many 
commodities  were  introduced  for  persons  reckoned  privi- 
leged who  were  not  so. 

Two  classes  of  nobles  divided  among  themselves  all  the 
offices :  that  of  the  sword  monopolized  the  positions  in  the 
army,  the  principal  dignities  in  the  Church,  and  the  chief 
places  at  court,  and  of  representation ;  that  of  the  robe 
filled  all  the  high  places  in  the  judiciary  and  administration. 
There  were  left  to  the  plebeian  only  manufactures,  com- 
merce, and  finance.  He  had  the  chance,  it  is  true,  if  his 
business  prospered,  of  purchasing  letters  of  nobility  and 
becoming  a  marquis,  though  sure  to  experience  the  sarcasms 
of  people  not  yet  ennobled,  and  the  perpetual  disdain  of 
those  who  were. 

The  nation  then  paid  in  taxes  almost  as  much  as  to-day. 
But  three  things  rendered  this  burden  much  heavier  for  that 
generation  than  for  this:  they  were  much  more  poor,  less 
numerous  by  a  third,  and  subjected  to  a  most  unequal 
assessment.  Thus  the  clergy,  which,  in  addition  to  the 
revenues  of  its  immense  property,  received  the  tithe  from 
all  land,  whether  noble  or  not,  paid  nothing  or  almost  noth- 
ing; it  made  "gratuitous  gifts."  The  nobility  and  the 
royal  officers,  except  in  certain  districts,  were  not  subjected 
to  the  villain  tax  or  the  land  tax;  they  were  subject  to  all 
the  other  direct  imposts,  the  capitation  tax  and  the  twentieth 
of  the  income,  but  a  great  number  found  means  for 
exemption  from  the  whole  or  a  part.  The  people  who  pos- 
sessed only  half  the  lands  of  France  alone  paid  the  villain 
tax,  91,000,000  francs,  the  seignorial  dues,  estimated  at 
35,000,000  francs,  the  forced  labor  on  the  roads,  20,000,000 
francs,  and  the  tithe.  The  latter  in  some  localities  was  a 
fortieth,  in  others  a  fourth,  of  the  net  product,  and  altogether 
cost  the  tillers  of  the  soil  133,000,000  francs.  For  the 
highways,  for  example,  many  of  which  were  constructed 
under  Louis  XV.,  the  state  defrayed  only  the  cost  of  indi- 
cating their  direction  and  of  engineering;  their  materials 
were  furnished  and  utilized  by  means  of  the  corvee,  or 
forced  contribution  and  forced  labor;  so  these  undertak- 
ings, so  beneficial  to  the  entire  country,  were  executed  at 
the  expense  of  the  rural  population  and  excited  their 
resentment. 

A  noble  was    beheaded ;  a  plebeian  was  hanged.     That, 


494  THE   FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

however,  could  hardly  be  real  ground  of  complaint,  inas- 
much as  the  difference  was  only  in  form.  But  it  often 
happened  that  for  the  same  offense  committed  in  common 
the  penalty  was  very  different  according  as  the  culprit  be- 
longed to  the  nobility  or  the  people. 

Corporations,  wardenships,  and  trade  franchises  pre- 
vented the  development  of  manufactures  by  limiting  the 
number  of  trade-masters,  whereby  competition  was  de- 
stroyed, and  by  permitting  the  exercise  of  only  that  trade 
wherein  one  had  served  his  apprenticeship.  Thus  each  was 
confined  in  his  craft  as  in  a  jail.  He  who  wished  to  become 
a  master  could  not  do  so  save  he  had  paid  for  a  trade  fran- 
chise 3000,  4000,  or  even  5000  francs.  In  that  sum  the  trial 
piece,  the  presents,  and  the  entertainment  are  not  reckoned. 
Even  after  having  disbursed  all  that  amount  the  applicant 
had  not  purchased  the  right  of  perfecting  his  industry,  for 
such  improvement  was  an  attack  on  the  antecedent  rights 
of  the  corporation.  The  weaver  of  stuffs  could  not  dye 
them;  he  who  dyed  the  thread  had  no  right  to  dye  the 
silken  or  woolen  stuff;  the  hatter  had  no  right  to  sell 
hosiery.  Chained  by  minute  regulations,  the  manufacturers 
were  liable  to  see  their  products  destroyed  by  the  police  for 
some  inadvertence,  or  for  some  modification  which  in  no  way 
injured  the  purchaser.  "Every  week  during  many  years," 
said  an  inspector  of  manufactures,  "1  have  seen  80  or  100 
pieces  of  goods  burned  at  Rouen  because  some  regulation 
upon  the  weaving  or  the  dyeing  had  not  been  absolutely 
observed,  .although  the  article  was  in  no  way  misrepre- 
sented." There  was  indeed  only  one  sort  of  money,  that 
of  the  king.  Afte_r  1726  commerce  had  not  been  hampered 
by  alterations  in  kind,  or  by  sudden  and  official  variations 
in  the  value  of  the  silver  mark,  but  it  was  still  distracted  by 
diversity  of  weights  and  measures,  which  varied  from  city  to 
city.  Till  1770  the  India  Company  by  its  commercial 
privileges  had  obstructed  the  efforts  of  private  merchants. 
That  company  had  just  been  abolished;  but  in  the  interior 
business  had  still  to  contend  with  injurious  restrictions  and 
harmful  monopolies.  Thus  at  Rouen  one  company  had  the 
monopoly  of  supplying  the  city  with  grain  ;  another  had  that 
of  the  transport  of  wheat;  a  third,  that  of  grinding  it  in  its 
mills,  to  the  great  injury  of  the  inhabitants,  who  were  for- 
bidden to  provide  themselves  elsewhere.  Grain  did  not 
circulate  from  one  province  to  another,  so  speculators  at 


CHAP.  XXX.]         ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  495 

will  could  produce  famine  or  abundance  at  given  points ;  that 
is  to  say,  they  could  in  one  place  sell  very  dear  or  buy  won- 
derfully cheap.  Finally,  the  interior  customhouses  which 
isolated  the  provinces  rendered  commercial  relations  as 
difficult  as  with  foreign  countries,  and  the  toll  houses  assessed 
96,000,000  francs  on  goods  transported.  To  descend  the 
Saone  and  the  Rhone  from  Gray  to  Aries,  one  had  to  stop 
and  pay  thirty  times,  so  that  on  this  route,  of  which  Nature 
herself  had  defrayed  all  the  cost,  commerce  left  in  the  hands 
of  the  tollkeepers  from  twenty-five  to  thirty  per  cent,  of  the 
value  of  the  articles  transported.  Let  us  add  that  the 
Catholic  countries  had  every  year  fifty  holidays  more  than 
the  Protestant  countries:  the  latter,  working  more,  could 
sell  cheaper.  Yet  the  French  colonies  were  so  flourishing 
and  European  industry  so  backward  that,  in  spite  of  all, 
French  commerce  prospered. 

Nearly  one-fifth  of  the  lands,  immobilized  in  the  hands  of 
the  clergy,  yielded  little,  because  it  was  withdrawn  from  the 
influence  of  personal  interest;  almost  all  the  rest,  cultivated 
on  halves  by  petty  farmers,  gave  hardly  more.  The  divi- 
sion of  property  had  begun;  but  the  land  only  came  into 
possession  of  the  peasants  encumbered  with  rents,  a  mark 
of  ancient  servitude.  There  were  few  cattle — not  one- 
fourth  as  many  as  in  France  to-day — and  consequently  there 
was  impoverishment  of  the  soil  as  result  of  insufficient  fer- 
tilization. Few  great  proprietors  were  themselves  cultiva- 
tors. "One  could  not  count,"  said  a  contemporary  writer, 
"three  hundred  lords  who  lived  on  their  lands."  This  is 
the  evil  from  which  Ireland  has  suffered  so  terribly  that  a 
word  has  been  coined  to  represent  it,  "absenteeism." 
Vauban  and  Bois-Guillebert  already  had  complained  of  the 
discredit  attaching  to  the  occupation  of  the  cultivator.  A 
decree  of  the  Council  of  State  was  necessary  in  1720  to 
authorize  nobles  without  derogation  of  rank  to  hire  for  cul- 
tivation the  lands  of  princes  of  the  blood.  A  writer  further- 
more said  in  1788:  "The  occupation  of  the  farmer  is 
despised  in  the  central  provinces,  but  is  less  discreditable  in 
Brie,  Beauce,  and  Picardy."  This  contempt  arose  from 
the  profound  misery  in  which  the  peasant  lived,  ruined  by 
imposts,  by  forced  labor,  and  by  the  restrictions  applied  to 
trade  in  grain;  he  was  ruined,  moreover,  by  the  seignorial 
rights  of  maintaining  warrens,  dovecotes,  and  hunting 
grounds,  all  of  which  were  so  many  scourges  for  the  field  of 


496  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BooK  VII. 

the  poor  man,  and  sometimes  even  for  that  of  the  rich. 
The  excellent  roads  constructed  under  Louis  XV.  were 
found  only  between  the  great  cities.  The  larger  number  of 
highways  in  France  are  not  more  than  a  century  old,  and  in 
many  of  the  provinces  the  roads  not  royal  were  impassable 
eight  months  in  the  year. 

As  to  liberty  of  persons  and  property,  the  former  was 
put  at  the  discretion  of  the  ministers  and  their  friends  by 
arbitrary  warrants  of  imprisonment  without  accusation  or 
trial;  the  latter  was  menaced  by  the  confiscation  which 
could  be  found  written  in  every  law,  by  the  arbitrary  power 
with  which  the  court  was  armed  for  the  creation  of  new 
imposts,  by  a  justice  which  was  not  always  impartial,  and  by 
decrees  of  suspension  which  dispensed  the  nobles  from  pay- 
ing their  debts. 

Malesherbes,  president  of  the  Court  of  Aids,  said  to  the 
king  in  remonstrances  that  have  remained  famous,  "Through 
arbitrary  warrants  of  imprisonment  no  citizen  is  secure  from 
beholding  his  liberty  sacrificed  to  satisfy  some  revenge,  for 
no  person  is  so  great  as  to  be  safe  from  the  hatred  of  a 
minister,  nor  so  humble  as  to  be  unworthy  of  that  of  a  tax 
farmer." 

The  most  severe  regulation  continued  in  vigor  against 
Dissenters.  In  1746,  200  Protestants  on  account  of  the 
exercise  of  their  worship  were  condemned  to  the  galleys 
or  imprisonment  by  the  parliament  of  Grenoble  alone.  In 
1762  the  parliament  of  Toulouse  had  a  pastor  hanged  for 
having  exercised  his  ministry  in  Languedoc,  and  beheaded 
three  young  gentlemen  who  had  armed  in  their  own  defense 
against  a  Catholic  riot.  The  same  magistrates  caused  the 
Protestant  Galas  to  be  broken  on  the  wheel  under  an  accu- 
sation of  having  killed  his  son,  who  wished,  it  was  said,  to 
become  a  Catholic,  but  who  in  reality  had  committed  sui- 
cide. Sirven  and  his  wife  in  1762  escaped  a  like  fate  only 
by  flight. 

Censorship  of  the  press  still  existed.  There  were  even 
several  censorships,  that  of  the  king,  that  of  Parliament,  and 
that  of  the  Sorbonne.  Often  they  contradicted  each  other. 
A  book  amnestied  by  one  was  burned  by  the  other.  Con- 
sequently it  circulated  at  a  higher  price,  but  circulated  none 
the  less,  sometimes  even  under  the  protection  of  the  ministers. 
The  law  ordered  the  penalty  of  branding,  of  the  galleys, 
of  death,  against  the  authors  or  colporteurs  of  books 


CHAP.  XXX.]         ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  497 

hostile  to  religion  or  the  state.  A  few  simple  persons  let 
themselves  be  arrested,  but  most  often  the  administration 
shut  its  eyes,  and  this  mingling  of  excessive  severity  and 
of  blind  toleration  only  irritated  public  curiosity.  The 
decrees  were  investigated  in  order  to  know  what  books  one 
should  read.  This  was  the  century  when  the  Abbe  Galiani 
defined  eloquence  as  "the  art  of  saying  everything  without 
going  to  the  Bastille."  Fre"ret  went  there  on  account  of 
an  article  on  the  Franks  ;  Lepre"vost  de  Beaumont,  secretary 
of  the  clergy,  remained  there  until  1789,  twenty-one 
years,  for  having  denounced  to  Parliament  the  "famine 
compact."* 

All  accounts  show  the  frightful  misery  of  the  people.  The 
peasants  of  Normandy  lived  in  great  part  on  oats  and  clothed 
themselves  with  skins;  in  Beauce,  the  granary  of  Paris,  the 
farmers  lived  on  alms  a  portion  of  the  year;  some  were 
reduced  to  making  bread  of  ferns.  In  a  great  number  of 
provinces  the  use  of  meat  was  unknown.  Says  a  writer 
about  1760:  "The  monthly  consumption  of  meat  by  three- 
fourths  of  the  population  of  France  did  not  amount  to  more 
than  a  pound  for  each  person.  Even  the  rich  were  poor, 
for  salaries  in  the  offices  which  they  bought  at  a  high  price, 
thereby  paralyzing  enormous  capital,  were  very  badly  paid 
by  the  state,  and  did  not  return  them  the  interest  of  their 
money,  while  their  vast  domains,  poorly  cultivated,  were 
almost  unproductive.  Vauban  estimated  that  in  all  France 
there  were  not  more  than  10,000  families  in  easy  circum- 
stances. Quesnay,  the  physician  of  Louis  XV.,  the 
"thinker,"  as  the  king  called  him,  estimated  that  the  income 
of  the  soil  did  not  bring  its  proprietors  more  than  75,000,- 
ooo  francs,  while  the  same  soil  to-day  yields  its  owners 
over  twenty  times  as  much.  His  estimate  was  without 
doubt  too  small,  but  it  is  sure  that  during  a  hundred  years 
the  population  has  not  doubled,  while  agriculture  has 
increased  its  products  several  fold.  Not  long  ago  a  few 
survivors  could  remember  the  miserable  clothing  with  which 
the  mass  of  the  people,  the  laborers,  were  protected  against 


*An  ironical  term,  suggested  by  the  "family  compact"  of  Choiseul, 
here  applied  to  the  attempt  of  certain  speculators  to  obtain  control  of  the 
grain,  thus  create  a  famine,  and  then  sell  at  their  own  prices.  That  this 
project  was  formed,  and  that  it  was  favored  by  the  Abbe  Terray,  con- 
troller general  from  1770  to  1774,  there  seems  no  doubt. — ED. 


498  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

the  inclemency  of  the  weather.  What  La  Bruyere  says  of 
the  peasant  presents  a  faithful  picture. 

Philanthropic  institutions  did  not  lack:  Christian  charity 
had  multiplied  them;  but,  since  the  financial  resources  of 
the  nation  were  very  limited,  relief  was  insufficient,  and 
bands  of  beggars  were  constantly  seen  traversing  the 
country  and  terrifying  the  cities.  France  had  then  about  800 
public  hospitals  whose  inmates  numbered  1 10,000  souls.  But 
the  mortality  in  them  was  frightful:  at  the  Hotel-Dieu  at 
Paris  it  was  annually  two  out  of  nine,  that  is  to  say,  three 
times  what  it  is  to-day.  So  great  was  the  inadequacy  of 
supplies,  and  so  great  the  ignorance  of  the  simplest  hygienic 
rules,  that  in  that  hospital,  the  richest  in  France,  people 
with  all  sorts  of  diseases,  even  those  the  most  contagious, 
were  brought  together  in  the  same  room,  and  sometimes  as 
many  as  five  or  six  in  the  same  bed ;  for  there  were  only 
1219  beds,  often  occupied  at  the  same  time  by  6000 
invalids.  "At  Bicetre, "  said  Necker  in  a  report  to  the  king, 
"I  have  found  in  the  same  bed  nine  old  men  wrapped  up 
in  rotten  rags." 

So,  in  view  of  all  these  causes,  there  is  no  reason  for 
astonishment  that  the  average  duration  of  human  life  was 
then  estimated  to  be  much  shorter  than  it  is  to-day. 

Thus  the  Middle  Ages,  destroyed  in  the  political  system, 
in  the  civil  system  still  existed.  Hence  arose  profound 
disagreement  between  the  constituent  elements  of  society. 
In  its  dominant  ideas  and  customs  the  world  had  readied 
the  eighteenth  century;  in  its  usages  and  in  many  of  its 
institutions  it  was  still  in  the  thirteenth.  As  soon  as  this 
difference  was  felt  a  revolution  was  imminent,  for  new 
ideas  necessarily  demand  new  institutions.  Yet  such  a 
result  was  desired  neither  by  the  court  nor  by  any  of  those 
who  throve  upon  abuses  as  upon  a  legitimate  property. 
Did  a  minister  speak  of  reform?  He  was  driven  from  his 
place.  Did  the  writers  seek  to  pierce  those  palpable  clouds 
gathered  by  the  government  around  itself?  A  decree  of  the 
council  absolutely  forbade  the  publication  of  anything 
whatsoever  upon  matters  of  public  administration.  In 
1768,  only  twenty  years  before  Mirabeau  and  the  Con- 
stitutional Assembly,  poor  wretches  were  sent  to  the 
galleys  for  having  sold  a  few  books  among  which  was 
"The  Man  for  Forty  Crowns,"  the  innocent  pamphlet  of 
Voltaire. 


CHAP.  XXX.]         ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  499 

Very  glorious  and  very  strong  must  be  the  government 

which  can  extinguish  under  its  feet  the  torch  lighted  by 

public  opinion.     Louis  XIV.   had  done  this 

Agitation    of      l  ,          .     J  ,  .        .  .  . 

mind    and  de-     when  it  cast  very  feeble  gleams.     This  Louis 

fbrml8  f°r  ""  XY-  could  not  do-  The  ruinous  abuses  of 
which  I  have  just  spoken,  those  rasping  ine- 
qualities, that  immense  disorder,  and  those  miseries  had 
provoked  examination  into  their  cause.  Vauban  and  Bois- 
Guillebert  had  demanded  reforms  from  the  economical  and 
Fenelon  from  the  political  point  of  view.  During  the 
regency  intellectual  liberty,  and  even  license,  were  in  keeping 
with  the  freedom  of  manners.  The  Duke  of  Bourbon 
endeavored  in  vain  to  arrest  such  impatient  investigation. 
Under  his  ministry  was  organized  the  Basement  Club,  the 
first  opened  in  France.  Fleury  closed  it.  But  at  the  same 
time  a  future  minister,  the  Marquis  d'Argenson,  in  his  "Con- 
siderations on  the  Government  of  France,"  written  before 
X739>  demanded  decentralization,  the  abandonment  of  all 
local  administration  to  municipal  and  cantonal  councils, 
freedom  of  trade  at  home  and  abroad,  and  the  use  of  the 
ballot  in  the  choice  of  royal  officers.  "It  will  be  said  that 
the  principles  of  the  present  treatise,  favorable  to  democracy, 
tend  to  the  destruction  of  the  nobility;  in  so  saying  men 
will  not  mistake!  ...  I  only  ask  that  the  most  stupid 
prejudice  should  be  set  aside  in  order  to  agree  that  two 
things  are  principally  desirable  for  the  welfare  of  the  state: 
first,  that  all  citizens  should  be  equal  each  to  each;  second, 
that  each  man  should  be  the  child  of  his  own  deeds.  The 
nobles  are  to  the  state  what  the  drones  are  to  the  hive." 
Therein  was  fully  announced  one  of  the  articles  of  faith 
of  the  Revolution.  Another  minister,  Machault,  proposed 
to  replace  the  villain  tax,  which  the  people  alone  paid,  by 
a  territorial  impost  to  which  the  privileged  classes,  nobles 
and  priests,  should  be  subjected.  Choiseul  himself  also 
spoke  of  reforms.  The  monasteries  seemed  to  him  as  to 
Colbert  too  numerous  ;  he  estimated,  as  did  the  estates  of 
Pontoise  in  1561,  that  discontinuance  of  the  immunity 
from  taxation  which  the  Church  enjoyed  in  its  immense 
dominions  would  in  a  marked  degree  contribute  to  the 
re-establishment  of  the  dilapidated  finances  of  the  state. 

If  such  ideas  were  fermenting  in  the  minds  of  public  men, 
what  was  not  being  said  by  those  who  had  undertaken  the 
task  of  examining  all  social,  political,  and  religious  ques- 


500  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.         [BOOK  VII. 

tions?  We  have  already  contemplated  the  entirely  new 
role  attempted  by  the  literature  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
This  intellectual  movement,  from  the  top  to  the  bottom  of 
society,  had  succeeded  in  creating  in  Europe  a  new  power, 
whose  influence  the  governments  commenced  to  feel,  and 
which  compelled  the  kings,  even  those  most  powerful,  to 
reckon  with  it.  In  France  the  nation,  for  a  long  time  the 
indifferent  spectator  of  those  patient  efforts,  had  finally 
taken  interest  in  them,  had  become  anxious  for  reforms  and 
desired  a  change. 

The  desire  was  common  that  the  administration  should  no 
longer  be  a  frightful  labyrinth  where  the  most  skillful  would 
lose  his  way;  that  the  public  finances  should  no  longer 
be  set  up  for  pillage;  that  each  man  should  have  security 
for  his  personal  liberty  and  for  his  fortune ;  that  the  crimi- 
nal code  should  be  less  bloody  and  the  civil  code  more 
just. 

The  demand  was  made  for  religious  toleration  instead  of 
a  dogma  imposed  under  penalty  of  death ;  for  law  founded 
upon  principles  of  natural  and  rational  right  in  place  of  the 
arbitrariness,  the  inequality,  and  the  confusion  of  384  pro- 
vincial customs;  for  similarity  of  weights  and  measures 
instead  of  the  most  extreme  confusion;  for  imposts  paid  by 
all  instead  of  the  taxation  of  misery  and  the  exemption  of 
wealth;  for  emancipation  of  labor,  and  for  free  competition 
instead  of  the  monoply  of  corporations;  for  free  admission 
to  public  offices  instead  of  the  privilege  of  birth  and  for- 
tune; for  the  most  active  solicitude  instead  of  indifference 
concerning  popular  interests;  in  a  word,  for  equality 
before  the  law  and  liberty  according  to  right. 

These  demands  were  so  vigorous  and  so  general  that  the 
necessity  of  doing  justice  to  them  was  evident  to  all  clear- 
seeing  eyes.  Never  was  a  more  terrible  movement  preceded 
by  more  numerous  prophets  sounding  the  alarm.  Catinat, 
Vauban,  St.  Simon,  even  Leibnitz,  during  the  lifetime  of 
Louis  XIV.  were  appalled  at  the  future.  As  early  as 
1697  a  magistrate,  Bois-Guillebert,  said:  "The  lawsuit  is 
now  about  to  take  place  between  those  who  pay  and  those 
whose  only  function  is  to  receive."  And  Fenelon  in  1710: 
"It  is  an  old,  shattered  machine  which  still  goes  on  with  the 
impulse  formerly  given  it,  and  which  will  finally  break  itself 
to  pieces  at  the  first  collision."  The  Duchess  of  Chateau- 
roux,  the  only  woman  who  wished  to  draw  Louis  XV.  from 


CHAP.  XXX.]         ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  501 

his  torpor,  "saw  a  great  overturning  at  hand  unless  some 
remedy  was  applied."  At  home,  abroad,  the  same  thing 
was  thought,  by  Lord  Chesterfield  as  well  as  by  the  German 
philosopher  and  profound  thinker,  Kant,  by  Malesherbes 
as  by  the  English  ambassador.  Said  the  first,  "Everything 
which  I  have  ever  met  in  the  history  of  symptoms,  pre- 
cursors of  great  revolutions,  exists  to-day  in  France  and 
daily  grows  larger." 

In  fact,  according  as  the  century  advanced  and  national 
shame  augmented,  as  after  Rossbach  there  was  the  pare 
aux  cerfs*  and  the  famine  compact,  voices  at  first  satirical 
became  stern  and  terrible.  The  reign  which  had  commenced 
with  the  "Persian  Letters"  ended  with  the  "Social  Con- 
tract." Some  hoped;  others  were  affrighted.  Rousseau  was 
consulted  in  1761  by  a  councilor  of  the  parliament  of  Paris 
upon  the  choice  of  an  asylum  in  Switzerland,  and  he  adds; 
"That  letter  did  not  by  any  means  surprise  me,  for  I  thought 
like  him  and  like  many  others  that  the  declining  constitu- 
tion menaced  France  with  speedy  ruin."  Two  years  later 
the  parliament  of  Rouen  said  to  the  king  himself:  "Evils 
are  at  their  height  and  presage  the  most  horrible  future." 
Finally,  Voltaire  wrote  (April  2,  1764)  to  the  Marquis  de 
Chauvelin:  "Everything  which  I  behold  is  sowing  the  seeds 
of  a  revolution  which  will  infallibly  come  about,  and  which 
I  shall  not  have  the  pleasure  of  witnessing.  The  French 
reach  everything  slowly,  but  at  last  they  reach  it.  The  light 
is  so  diffused  from  one  place  to  another  that  it  will  burst 
forth  at  the  first  opportunity  and  there  will  be  a  fine  uproar. 
The  young  people  are  very  fortunate :  they  will  see  splendid 
things." 

Those  splendid  things  were  unhappily  mingled  with  horrid 
catastrophies,  which  could  have  been  forestalled  by  earlier 
concessions  to  legitimate  desires.  A  timid  attempt  was 
made;  in  the  second  half  of  the  eighteenth  century  the 
government,  aroused  and  excited  by  French  ideas,  recog- 


*  Name  given  to  the  buildings  and  grounds  occupying  a  large  portion 
of  the  park  at  Versailles,  and  in  which  under  Louis  XIII.  deer  were  shut 
up.  Under  Louis  XV.  these  buildings  were  replaced  by  elegant  edifices 
wherein  were  confined  young  girls  of  unusual  beauty  who  had  been  kid- 
napped or  bought  from  their  parents,  and  who  served  the  infamous 
pleasures  of  the  king.  The  expenses  of  this  establishment  amounted  to 
over  $20,000,000. — ED. 


502  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.         [BOOK  VII. 

nized  the  necessity  of  accomplishing  reforms,  would  it  con- 
jure away  a  revolution. 

The  movement  extended  from  one  end  of  Europe  to  the 
other;  its  existence  can  be  demonstrated  in  Portugal  and  fol- 
lowed across  all  the  continent  to  the  depths  of  Russia.  Let 
us  consider  its  character  and  consequences. 

Joseph  I.,  fourth  successor  of  that  John  IV.  of  Braganza 
who  in  1640  had  freed  Portugal  from  Spanish  domination, 

_  ,  wished  in  his  turn  to  deliver  it  from  its  miser- 

Reforms    ac-       ,  ,  , .  . 

compiished  by    able  condition. 

ments.  govern'  He  intrusted  the  power  to  Joseph  of  Car- 
valho  (1750),  who  was  afterward  created  Mar- 
quis of  Pombal.  That  minister  endeavored  to  become  the 
Richelieu  of  Portugal.  Fearing  that  the  influence  of  the 
Jesuits  would  thwart  his  projects,  he  implicated  that  order 
in  a  plot  to  which  an  attack  upon  the  life  of  the  prince  gave 
plausibility,  and  they  were  expelled  from  the  kingdom  (1759). 
He  diminished  the  power  of  the  Inquisition;  he  intimidated 
the  nobles  by  exiling  the  most  illustrious  lords,  a  Souza,  a 
Braganza.  An  earthquake  which  cost  the  life  of  30,000 
persons  destroyed  Lisbon  (1755);  he  rebuilt  it  in  a  few 
years  and  made  it  one  of  the  most  beautiful  cities  of  Europe. 
From  that  moment  every  year  was  marked  by  useful  crea- 
tions or  honorable  attempts:  manufactures  were  encouraged 
by  increasing  the  duties  levied  on  foreign  products ;  agri- 
culture was  stimulated  by  the  foundation  of  a  special  school, 
by  the  construction  of  the  canal  of  Oe'yras,  and  by  drain- 
ing the  Alentejo;  public  instruction  was  aided  by  the 
foundation  of  a  college  for  the  nobles  and  of  free  public 
schools;  the  army  was  reorganized,  the  pay  of  the  soldiers 
made  secure,  and  its  effective  force  raised  to  32,000  men; 
reform  was  introduced  into  the  collection  of  the  taxes,  and 
the  financial  administration  was  improved;  the  piracies  of  the 
Barbary  states  were  repressed;  the  island  of  Mozambique, 
the  key  of  Portuguese  commerce  in  the  Indies,  was  forti- 
fied; more  colonists  were  sent  to  Brazil;  in  1763  the 
immense  grants  of  lands  in  Africa  and  America  which 
had  been  made  by  the  predecessors  of  Joseph  I.  were 
revoked ;  in  1754  a  commercial  company  was  established  to 
monopolize  the  trade  with  China  and  the  Indies,  and  in 
1755  another  was  formed  called  the  Company  of  Maranhao 
and  the  Grao  Para.  Unfortunately  he  wished  to  do  good 
violently,  and  good  is  not  thus  done.  His  best  institu- 


CHAP.  XXX.]         ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  $03 

tions  were  victims  of  the  violence  which  had  established 
them,  and  Portugal,  a  moment  galvanized  by  his  powerful 
administration,  fell  back  after  him  into  its  former  feebleness. 
Under  Pedro  IV.  in  1781  Pombal  was  declared  a  criminal 
and  deserving  of  severe  punishment ;  however,  the  govern- 
ment was  satisfied  with  sending  him  into  exile,  where  he  died 
ten  months  later. 

Spain  also  revived  under  her  new  dynasty.  Philip  V.,  an 
indolent  prince,  did  very  little  for  her  regeneration.  He 
resigned,  then  resumed,  his  crown,  and  always  let  himself  be 
governed  by  others:  by  the  Princess  Orsini;  by  Alberoni, 
who  came  near  setting  Europe  on  fire;  by  his  second  wife, 
Elizabeth  Farnese,  who  involved  him  in  wars  at  the  end  of 
which  he  at  least  obtained  the  kingdom  of  the  Two  Sicilies 
for  one  of  his  sons  (1734),  and  Parma  and  Piacenza  for  the 
other  ( 1 748) ;  finally,  by  the  wise  Patinho,  who  was  emphatic- 
ally dubbed  "the  Colbert  of  Spain,"  but  who  labored  to 
restore  the  Spanish  navy. 

Under  Ferdinand  VI.  this  upward  tendency  became  more 
definite  (1746-59).  This  sovereign  on  two  days  every  week 
accorded  an  audience  to  every  comer.  He  diminished  the 
imposts,  encouraged  agriculture,  improved  the  administra- 
tion of  the  finances  and  of  justice,  reanimated  commerce, 
manufactures,  and  the  navy,  dug  the  canal  of  Castile,  and  in 
1753  concluded  with  the  Holy  See  a  concordat  which  left  to 
the  King  of  Spain  the  bestowal  of  the  ecclesiastical  benefices. 
When  he  died  at  the  age  of  forty-five  the  treasury  contained 
nearly  59,000,000  francs.  During  his  reign  Lima  and  Quito 
in  Peru  were  almost  destroyed  by  earthquakes;  Spain  had 
suffered  also  in  that  of  Lisbon. 

Don  Carlos,  the  eldest  son  of  Philip  V.  and  of  his  second 
wife,  Elizabeth  Farnese,  gave  up  to  one  of  his  children  the 
crown  of  Naples,  which  he  had  worn  since  1734,  and  took 
that  of  Spain  under  the  name  of  Charles  III.  (1759-88). 
He  summoned  to  the  ministry  in  1766  an  able  diplomat, 
Count  d'Aranda,  who  in  a  single  night  had  2300  Jesuits 
arrested  and  conducted  beyond  the  frontier  (1767).  All 
correspondence  with  them  was  forbidden;  they  were  allowed 
only  a  small  pension;  of  this  they  were  finally  all  deprived 
on  account  of  the  bad  conduct  of  one  in  their  number. 
Naples  and  Parma  imitated  this  example,  and  in  1773  Pope 
Clement  XIV.  decreed  the  abolition  of  the  order.  This 
measure  showed  that  the  minister  would  tolerate  no  abuses. 


504  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

He  established  a  police  which  gave  security  to  Madrid,  had 
a  census  taken  of  the  population,  limited  the  rosarios,  or 
religious  processions,  and  even  attacked  the  Inquisition. 
Rome  and  the  clergy  in  1773  succeeded  in  removing  him 
from  the  ministry  by  sending  him  as  ambassador  to  France. 
But  one  of  his  successors,  the  Count  de  Florida  Blanca,  son 
of  a  plain  burgess  of  Murcia,  sought  like  him  the  regenera- 
tion of  his  country,  so  the  reforms  by  no  means  stopped. 

In  order  to  fill  the  gaps  in  the  population  and  to  revive 
agriculture  numerous  German  fanners  were  invited  into  the 
peninsula.  The  highways  were  repaired ;  the  canal  of  Ara- 
gon,  opened  under  Charles  V.,  was  continued;  the  canals 
of  Manzanares,  of  Murcia,  of  Guadarama,  of  San  Carlos, 
and  of  Urgel  were  begun;  domestic  trade  in  grain  was  made 
free;  and  the  Bank  of  St.  Charles  was  founded.  The  cloth 
manufactory  of  Gaudalaxara,  organized  by  Alberoni  in  1718, 
was  united  to  that  of  San  Fernando,  which  thereupon  gave 
employment  to  24,000  workmen.  The  linen  manufactory 
of  St.  Ildephonse  and  the  armory  at  Toledo  were  encour- 
aged. A  decree  of  1773  declared  that  commerce  and  manu- 
factures were  in  no  way  derogatory  to  the  nobility ;  other 
decrees  endowed  Spain  with  a  collection  of  natural  history, 
with  a  botanical  garden,  with  several  academies  of  painting 
and  drawing,  with  a  general  customhouse  and  post  office. 
For  the  army  and  navy  an  artillery  school  was  founded  at 
Segovia,  a  school  of  engineers  at  Cartagena,  of  cavalry  at 
Ocana,  of  tactics  at  Avila,  and  the  fleet  was  raised  from  37 
ships  of  the  line,  which  it  numbered  in  1761,  to  almost  8oj 
so  it  was  able  to  appear  with  honor  in  the  American  war  at 
the  side  of  the  French  squadrons.  However,  Charles  III. 
failed  in  two  attempts  against  the  Barbary  pirates,  and  could 
not  retake  Gibraltar  from  the  English.  When  he  died  in 
1788  the  revenues  of  Spain  had  tripled  and  its  population 
increased  from  seven  to  eleven  millions.  His  work  was 
unfortunately  compromised  by  the  incapacity  of  his  suc- 
cessor, the  feeble  Charles  IV.,  who  at  Bayonne  was  to  resign 
his  throne  into  the  hands  of  Napoleon. 

Before  becoming  King  of  Spain  Charles  III.  had  gov- 
erned the  kingdom  of  Naples  under  the  name  of  Charles 
VII.  There  also  he  had  accomplished  happy  reforms  with 
the  aid  of  his  minister,  Bernardo  Tanucci.  There  were  in 
the  kingdom  no  less  than  eleven  distinct  systems  of  legisla- 
tion, a  heritage  left  by  the  eleven  peoples,  Normans,  Swa- 


CHAP.  XXX.]          ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  505 

bians,  Angevines,  Aragonese,  Austrians,  and  others,  who 
had  possessed  the  country  in  whole  or  in  part.  These  were 
simplified  and  a  uniform  code  undertaken.  The  clergy  pos- 
sessed privileges  and  immunities  incompatible  with  the  good 
order  of  the  state.  These  were  diminished  by  a  concordat 
signed  with  Pope  Benedict  XIV.  in  1741,  which  also  limited 
the  number  of  priests  by  reducing  the  ordinations  to  10  for 
every  1000  souls.  Tanucci  then  attacked,  not  in  their 
property,  bufin  their  jurisdictions,  the  nobility,  who  wished 
to  remain  feudal.  He  made  the  law  higher  than  the 
grandees,  the  tribunals  than  seignorial  justice,  and  rendered 
the  nobles  more  docile  by  inviting  them  to  the  court. 
Sciences  and  letters  were  encouraged,  the  Academy  of 
Herculaneum  and  other  academies  founded,  the  higher 
studies  and  secondary  instruction  strengthened  by  impor- 
tant improvements,  and  Naples  embellished  with  magnificent 
monuments,  as  the  Theater  of  San  Carlo  and  the  Royal 
Hospital  for  the  Poor.  Regent  during  the  minority  of  Fer- 
dinand IV.,  who  at  the  age  of  eight  succeeded  Charles  VII. 
in  1759,  Tanucci  acted  with  still  more  vigor;  he  abolished 
tithes,  suppressed  a  great  number  of  monasteries,  reduced 
by  a  half  the  ecclesiastical  body,  banished  the  Jesuits 
(1767),  and  reorganized  public  instruction.  A  disgrace 
terminated  his  ministry,  which  lasted  no  less  than  forty-three 
years  (1734-77),  during  which  he  had  touched  many 
things,  but  without  obtaining  durable  results.  The  reign 
of  Ferdinand  IV.  continued  in  the  midst  of  the  greatest 
adventures  till  1825.  After  Tanucci  everything  at  Naples 
depended  upon  the  caprices  of  the  queen  Maria  Carolina, 
sister  of  the  emperor  Joseph  II.,  and  famous  on  more  than 
one  account,  especially  for  her  hatred  against  the  French 
after  1789. 

On  the  death  in  1737  of  John  Gaston,  the  last  of  the 
Medicis,  Tuscany  had  been  assigned  to  the  husband  of 
Maria  Theresa,  Francis,  Duke  of  Lorraine,  who  became 
emperor  in  1745.  Under  this  prince,  who  as  a  foreigner 
was  little  loved  by  the  Tuscans,  wise  reforms  were  intro- 
duced into  legislation  and  finance  by  the  able  ministers,  the 
Prince  de  Craon  and  Count  de  Richecourt.  His  second 
son,  Peter  Leopold,  brother  of  the  emperor  Joseph  II.  and 
of  Marie  Antoinette,  Queen  of  France,  governed  Tuscany 
from  1765  to  1790.  "Constantly  occupied  in  reforming  all 
the  abuses  introduced  during  more  than  two  hundred  years 


506  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

by  a  vicious  administration,  he  simplified  the  criminal  laws, 
restored  freedom  to  commerce,  rescued  entire  provinces 
from  beneath  the  waters,  and  divided  the  land  thus  gained 
among  industrious  cultivators,  whom  he  charged  a  by  no 
means  exorbitant  rent;  he  thus  doubled  the  products  of 
agriculture,  and  restored  to  his  subjects  an  activity  and 
industry  which  they  had  long  since  lost.  But  sometimes  he 
angered  them  by  an  inquisitorial  vigilance,  and  he  encoun- 
tered violent  opposition  in  his  ecclesiastical  reforms.  The 
people  who  owed  him  so  much  regretted  him  little."  (Sis- 
mondi).  He  had  abolished  the  death  penalty. 

In  the  states  of  the  King'of  Sardinia  two  edicts  of  1761 
and  1762  had  accorded  emancipation  from  feudal  claims, 
a  boon  which  France  was  to  obtain  only  after  1789. 

The  new  spirit,  introduced  by  the  emperor  Joseph  II., 
son  of  Maria  Theresa,  penetrated  even  aged  Austria.  This 
prince  had  been  elected  Emperor  of  Germany  on  the  death 
of  his  father,  Francis  I.  of  Lorraine,  in  1765,  but  his  mother 
had  retained  the  power  in  the  Austrian  states.  Following 
then  the  example  of  Peter  the  Great,  eager  to  learn,  but 
without  the  patience  to  ttach  himself,  as  Frederick  II.  said 
in  a  letter,  Joseph  II.  began  to  visit  foreign  countries,  and 
then  traversed  his  own  dominions;  on  the  death  of  his 
mother  in  1780  he  launched  impetuously  into  his  re- 
forms. 

The  different  countries  which  formed  the  Austrian  state, 
each  governing  itself  by  its  own  laws,  had  no  bond  between 
them;  Joseph  endeavored  to  unite  them  by  one  vast  admin- 
istrative organization.  He  abolished  separate  jurisdic- 
tions and  divided  the  territory  into  thirteen  governments 
subdivided  into  districts.  There  were  as  many  courts  of 
justice,  as  many  military  commands  and  police  magistrates, 
as  there  were  governments.  The  general  administration 
was  divided  into  four  departments,  of  Politics,  of  Adminis- 
tration properly  so  called,  of  Justice,  and  of  War.  All  affairs 
were  centralized  in  the  state  chanceries  of  Vienna,  and  the 
Provinical  States  were  suppressed ;  the  despotism  of  the 
emperor  was  substituted  for  the  vexations  of  the  feudal 
regime. 

In  1780  tithes,  forced  labor,  and  seignorial  rights  were 
abolished.  A  single  religion,  the  Roman  Catholic,  was 
recognized;  but  papal  bulls  had  no  force  till  after  approval 
by  the  emperor,  and  the  members  of  the  clergy  were  sub- 


CHAP.  XXX.]          ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  507 

ordinated  to  the  temporal  power;  the  revenues  of  certain 
bishoprics  were  reduced;  more  than  one  thousand  monas- 
teries were  converted  into  hospitals,  houses  of  instruction,  or 
barracks;  four  hundred  new  parishes  were  founded;  wor- 
ship was  freed  from  certain  superstitious  practices;  the 
right  of  primogeniture  was  abolished ;  marriage  was  declared 
a  simple  civil  contract  and  divorce  facilitated.  A  celebrated 
edict  of  toleration  (October  13,  1781)  authorized  the  exer- 
cise of  the  Greek  and  Protestant  worship,  the  Jews  were 
admitted  to  the  public  schools  and  a  new  translation  of  the 
Bible  was  made  into  German.  Pope  Pius  VI.,  who  under- 
took a  journey  to  Vienna  in  order  to  arrest  the  emperor  in 
his  reforms,  obtained  only  the  courtesies  due  to  his  age  and 
his  character. 

Joseph  II.  was  by  no  means  learned;  however,  he  encour- 
aged the  sciences  and  arts;  he  founded  universities,  public 
libraries,  and  chairs  of  the  physical  and  natural  sciences, 
and  took  away  from  ecclesiastics  the  censorship  of  books 
in  order  to  bestow  it  on  enlightened  men  of  letters;  but  he 
forbade  his  subjects  to  travel  to  foreign  countries  before 
they  were  twenty-seven  years  old.  Commerce  and  national 
industry  received  a  profound  impulse;  manufactures  were 
established,  provincial  customhouses  abolished  ;  the  impor- 
tation of  foreign  goods  was  subjected  to  enormous  duties ; 
the  provinces  were  for  the  first  time  authorized  to  exchange 
their  products ;  Trieste  and  Fiume  were  declared  free  ports; 
new  routes  were  opened,  and  canals  dug  or  repaired. 

So  Joseph  II.  touched  everything.  He  wished  to  renew 
all,  to  improve  the  material  well-being  of  his  subjects  and 
especially  to  increase  his  power.  But  he  erred  in  combin- 
ing this  work  of  internal  reforms  with  an  aggressive  policy 
and  an  unbounded  ambition.  His  claims  to  Maestricht  and 
to  the  country  on  the  other  side  of  the  Meuse  involved  him 
in  quarrels  with  Holland,  which  ended  in  extorting  from  the 
latter  10,000,000  florins  and  in  making  her  contract  an 
alliance  with  France.  His  schemes  upon  Bavaria  brought 
about  the  conclusion  of  a  new  league,  offensive  and  defen- 
sive, between  the  kings  of  Prussia  and  England,  the  elec- 
tors of  Saxony  and  Mentz,  and  a  multitude  of  German 
princes.  He  dreamed  of  dividing  the  Ottoman  empire  with 
Russia,  and  when  the  sultan,  who  felt  himself  threatened, 
declared  war  against  the  Russians  (1787),  Joseph,  alleging 
that  he  was  the  ally  of  Russia,  attacked  the  Porte  without 


508  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

reason  (1788).  He  failed,  however,  before  Belgrade;  the 
Grand  Vizier  Yusuf  penetrated  into  Hungary,  and  he  was 
himself  defeated  at  Temesvar.  Field  Marshal  Laudon  and 
the  Prince  of  Coburg  restored  the  honor  of  his  arms;  but 
the  peace  of  1791  assured  to  Austria  in  return  for  her  enor- 
mous expenses  no  other  advantages  than  the  acquisition  of 
two  petty  territories.  But  troubles  broke  out  in  Hungary, 
where  the  nobles  were  his  enemies  because  he  had  violated 
their  feudal  privileges,  and  where  the  people  were  hostile  to 
him  because  he  had  wounded  them  by  his  religious  innova- 
tions; the  Netherlands  rose,  because  he  wished  to  subject 
them  to  new  imposts  while  depriving  them  of  their  ancient 
liberties;  finally,  the  French  Revolution  bursting  forth 
menaced  not  only  the  power  of  his  sister,  Maria  Antoinette, 
but  of  every  absolute  king.  Joseph  11.  regretted  what  he 
had  done,  was  appalled  at  the  future,  and  sadly  descended 
to  the  tomb  (February  20,  1790). 

We  have  seen  the  glorious  place  which  Frederick  II., 
King  of  Prussia,  had  taken  among  the  princes  who  sought 
to  be  the  reformers  of  the  eighteenth  century.  She  whom 
her  conquests  caused  to  be  called  Catherine  the  Great 
aspired  to  similar  distinction.  She  flattered  western  civiliza- 
tion in  its  principal  representatives,  carried  on  a  correspond- 
ence with  Voltaire  and  with  the  Encyclopedists,  invited 
d'Alembert  and  Diderot  to  live  near  her,  and  herself  trans- 
lated the  "Belisaire"  of  Marmontel.  But  at  the  same  time 
she  wrote  to  the  Governor  of  Moscow,  who  complained  that 
the  newly  founded  schools  remained  empty,  the  words  which 
we  have  already  quoted. 

In  Sweden  Gustavus  III.,  who  by  the  revolution  of  1772 
had  reseized  absolute  power,  abolished  torture  and  checked 
the  venality  of  the  judges.  He  founded  workhouses  for 
beggars,  ordered  that  physicians  at  the  expense  of  the  state 
should  visit  even  the  remotest  villages,  and  that  every  day 
laborer  the  father  of  four  children  should  be  exempt  from 
personal  taxation.  He  attracted  workmen  from  all  the 
countries  of  Europe  and  doubled  the  product  of  the  iron 
and  copper  mines,  the  chief  wealth  of  the  country.  Com- 
merce increased,  favored  by  the  privileges  accorded  to  sea- 
men, and  by  the  fact  that  Marstrand  at  the  mouth  of  the 
Cattegat  was  made  a  free  port.  Grain  could  circulate  freely; 
by  the  aboltion  of  twenty-two  holidays  the  product  of 
the  national  labor  increased.  Like  Frederick  II.,  Gustavus 


CHAP.  XXX.]          ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  509 

III.  wrote  much,  even  attempting  dramas,  and  like  him  was 
a  passionate  admirer  of  French  literature. 

It  was  France  who  had  given  the  impulsion  to  the  grand 

movement  that   agitated    entire    Europe,   and    she   herself 

Last  years  of  seemed   destined   not   to   participate   in   the 

Louis  xv.  0763-   reforms  which  her  ideas  had  caused  to  be  ob- 

74);  political  and          .         ,     .  . 

military  decline  tamed  for  other  peoples.  Instead  of  being 
regenerated  each  day  she  descended  lower 
on  the  slope  which  removed  her  far  from  the  high 
position  whither  she  had  been  carried  by  the  preceding 
century.  She  was  enfeebled  by  the  successes  of  Frederick 
II.,  and  by  the  advent  of  a  new  state  among  the  great 
powers.  At  the  treaty  of  Aix-la-Chapelle  she  appeared  the 
foremost  of  military  states,  thanks  to  the  victories  of  Mar- 
shal Saxe  which  had  thrown  upon  her  a  reflection  of  the 
glory  of  Louis  XIV.  But  the  Seven  Years'  War  had 
shown  the  folly  of  the  French  generals,  the  lack  of  disci- 
pline among  her  soldiers,  and,  despite  a  few  happy  excep- 
tions, the  decline  in  French  military  qualities.  On  the  sea 
it  was  not  only  decadence:  it  was  complete  downfall.  To 
repair  her  ruins,  to  arrest  the  internal  disorganization,  to 
make  headway  with  appropriate  reforms  against  the  revolu- 
tion that  was  approaching,  none  could  count  upon  the  prince 
who  was  himself  abandoned  to  the  most  shameful  disorders. 
What  Louis  was  incapable  of  himself  doing  he  meant  no 
other  should  do;  not  that  he  possessed  a  great  minister,  for 
the  Duke  of  Choiseul  was  only  an  able  man  who  loved  his 
country  and  who  saw  a  few  of  the  national  ills  that  must  be 
cured.  He  was  confined  to  the  administration  of  his  two 
ministries  of  war  and  marine,  and  concerned  himself  only 
with  the  military  organization  of  France  and  with  her 
foreign  alliances.  When  peace  was  made  he  endeavored  to 
lessen  the  waste  of  which  the  army  was  the  victim,  and  to 
bring  up  its  ranks  to  the  full  quota,  so  that  a  rapid  transition 
from  a  peace  to  a  war  footing  should  be  easy.  He  resumed 
the  work  of  Machault  in  the  creation  of  a  fleet,  and  had  64 
vessels  and  50  frigates  or  corvettes  constructed.  Corsica, 
which  had  revolted  against  the  Genoese,  its  former  masters, 
was  conquered  and  in  1768  united  to  the  French  territory. 
In  1769  Napoleon  was  born  there,  just  in  time  to  be  a 
Frenchman.  Three  years  earlier  the  death  of  Stanislaus 
had  brought  about  the  reunion  of  Lorraine  to  France.  The 
English  threatened  Spain  with  war:  Choiseul  forthwith  pre- 


5io  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

pared  a  formidable  armament,  which  made  them  reflect.  At 
the  same  time  he  encouraged  the  opposition  which  was 
developing  among  the  Anglo-American  colonies  against  their 
mother  country;  he  detached  Portugal  and  Holland  from 
the  English  alliance,  endeavored  to  fortify  the  Swedish 
government  against  the  intrigues  of  Russia,  and  extended 
a  friendly  hand  to  Poland,  which  under  the  weight  of  the 
vices  in  its  constitution  daily  drew  nearer  the  abyss.  This 
foreign  policy  experienced  only  one  reverse  in  the  unfortu- 
nate attempt  to  colonize  Guiana.  One  important  act  of 
Choiseul's  administration,  although  not  emanating  directly 
from  him,  was  the  suppression  of  the  Jesuits,  whose  constitu- 
tion was  condemned  by  a  decree  of  Parliament  in  1762  after 
a  famous  trial,  occasioned  by  the  bankruptcy  for  3,000,000 
francs  of  Father  Lavalette,  prefect  of  the  missions  to  the 
Antilles.  The  Jesuits  left  behind  them  a  powerful  party 
which  did  not  pardon  the  minister  for  their  expulsion.  In 
order  to  destroy  him  every  means  was  employed.  To  Mme. 
de  Pompadour,  who  had  died  in  1768,  the  Countess  du 
Barry  succeeded,  whose  mere  presence  was  a  stain  upon 
Versailles.  The  Duke  de  Choiseul  refused  to  bend  before 
that  woman.  She  beset  the  king  to  obtain  his  dismissal. 
In  1770  he  was  exiled. 

During  all  the  century  the  parliaments  had  shown  a  spirit 
of  opposition  which  the  king  endured  with  difficulty.  Their 
contentions  with  the  clergy  in  regard  to  the  bull  Unigenitus, 
which  condemned  the  Jansenists,  and  which  the  parliaments 
rejected,  disturbed  all  the  eighteenth  century.  The  king, 
having  vainly  striven  to  impose  silence  upon  them,  exiled 
them  in  1753.  They  returned  just  as  determined  to  con- 
cede nothing.  The  trial  of  the  Jesuits  revived  the  quarrel; 
another  in  1770  against  the  Duke  d'Aiguillon  made  the 
struggle  burst  out.  The  king  in  a  bed  of  justice  having 
stopped  the  proceedings,  the  magistrates  suspended  the 
administration  of  justice.  "They  wish,"  said  the  king,  "to 
subject  the  crown  to  the  clerk's  office."  He  bestowed  upon 
d'Aiguillon  the  place  of  Choiseul,  and  the  Chancellor  Mau- 
peou  suppressed  the  parliaments,  which  he  replaced  by  new 
courts  of  judicature.  This  was  a  portentous  event.  Riche- 
lieu and  Louis  XIV.  had  destroyed  the  political  importance 
of  the  nobility.  Louis  XV.  destroyed  the  great  body  of  the 
magistracy.  What  remained  to  prop  up  the  old  edifice  and 
to  shelter  the  monarch? 


CHAP.  XXX.]          ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  511 

And  everyday  the  shame  of  that  monarch  increased.  In 
1773  it  was  Poland  which  Austria,  Prussia,  and  Russia 
divided  without  anything  being  done  by  France  to  hinder 
this  execution  of  an  entire  people.  In  1765  it  was  the  asso- 
ciation called  the  famine  compact,  which  was  above  all  a 
detestable  administrative  measure,  and  which  obtained 
renewal  of  its  lease  for  the  monopoly  of  grain  and  thus 
brought  about  the  artificial  famines  of  1768  and  1769.  It 
was  lettres  de  cachet,  which  were  multiplied  in  an  appalling 
degree,  and  which  surrendered  the  liberty  of  citizens  to  any 
rich  or  powerful  person  who  had  a  passion  to  satiate  or  a 
revenge  to  satisfy.  It  was  finally  the  Abb6  Terray,  who 
found  no  other  remedy  for  reduction  of  the  state  debt  than 
bankruptcy.  To  the  protestations  which  rose  from  every 
side  Terray  coldly  replied:  "The  king  is  the  master;  neces- 
sity knows  no  law."  He  none  the  less  permitted  the  exist- 
ence of  an  annual  deficit  of  41,000,000  francs.  And  yet 
since  1715  the  imposts  had  more  than  doubled,  having  risen 
from  165,000,000  to  365,000,000  francs.  Louis  XV.  did 
not  fail  to  see  that  some  terrible  expiation  was  approaching, 
but  he  found  consolation  in  saying:  "It  will  surely  last  as 
long  as  I ;  my  successor  will  get  out  of  it  as  best  he  can." 

His  successor  was  only  twenty  years  old.  He  was  the 
son  of  the  Dauphin,  consequently  grandson  of  Louis  XV. 
Attempt  at  He  was  a  prince  of  pure  morals,  of  limited 
and  abandon-  intelligence,  of  extreme  timidity  of  character 
under"  ^Louis  and  speech,  who  loved  the  good,  who  wished 
xvi.  (1774-89).  i^  IDU(-  who  was  unhappily  too  weak  to 
impose  his  will  upon  the  people  about  him.  First  he 
dispensed  the  people  from  the  gift  of  joyous  advent;  he 
reformed  the  law  which  rendered  the  taxpayers  jointly 
responsible  for  the  payment  of  the  imposts;  and  in  order  to 
give  an  early  satisfaction  to  public  opinion  he  recalled  Par- 
liament. He  caused  the  aged  and  frivolous  Maurepas  to 
re-enter  the  ministry;  but  he  replaced  Maupeou  and  Terray 
by  Malesherbes  and  Turgot.  The  former  as  early  as  1771 
had  demanded  the  convocation  of  the  States  General,  and 
the  latter  was  a  man  of  superior  intellect,  and  the  only  states- 
man of  that  age  who  could  have  forestalled  the  Revolution 
by  making  and  directing  it  himself.  Later  the  king  gave 
the  ministry  of  war  to  another  honest  man,  the  Count  of  St. 
Germain,  who  wished  to  reorganize  the  army  just  as  his  col- 
leagues intended  to  reorganize  the  finances  and  administra- 


512  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

tion,  but  who,  with  good  ideas  and  injudicious  execution, 
hastily  laid  his  hands  on  many  things,  and  on  the  whole 
injured  the  general  cause  of  reform. 

Turgot  would  have  wished  to  apply  at  once  the  vast  refor- 
matory scheme  he  had  conceived,  but  the  opposition  which 
his  first  attempts  encountered  obliged  him  to  proceed  slowly. 
He  attended  first  to  what  was  most  pressing.  He  authorized 
the  free  circulation  of  grain  and  flour  throughout  all  the 
kingdom;  his  enemies  hastened  to  spread  the  rumor  that 
their  exportation  was  going  to  be  permitted;  the  people 
were  made  to  fear  a  famine.  Riots  broke  out  in  the  country 
districts,  and  even  at  Versailles  and  Paris.  It  was  neces- 
sary to  use  force  (May,  1775).  A  more  violent  explosion 
against  Turgot  took  place  when  he  had  caused  the  adoption 
by  the  king  of  a  project  for  replacing  forced  labor  on  the 
roads  by  an  impost  which  the  proprietors  were  to  pay.  The 
abolition  of  wardenships  and  trade  privileges,  that  is  to  say, 
the  introduction  of  liberty  into  manufactures  as  he  had 
wished  to  introduce  it  into  commerce,  further  increased  the 
number  of  his  enemies. 

The  chief  minister,  Maurepas,  stealthily  undermined  his 
credit  with  the  king;  the  queen  attacked  a  controller 
general  who  talked  only  of  economies.  Malesherbes,  perse- 
cuted like  him  by  the  anger  of  the  privileged  classes,  was 
the  first  to  give  way;  he  tendered  his  resignation;  Tur- 
got, of  stronger  metal,  waited  for  his  dismissal.  On  May 
12,  1776,  he  received  the  order  to  quit  the  ministry.  Vol- 
taire addressed  to  him  his  "Epistle  to  a  Man,"  and  Andre 
Chenier  celebrated  his  name  in  his  "Hymn  to  France." 
Four  months  had  hardly  passed  when  the  king  granted  to 
the  privileged  classes  the  re-establishment  of  forced  labor 
and  of  trade  privileges. 

However,  the  American  war  was  about  to  begin.  In 
order  to  meet  the  new  expenses  recourse  was  had  to  the 
Genoese  banker  Necker,  who  enjoyed  a  high  reputation  as 
a  financier.  As  he  was  a  Protestant  and  a  foreigner,  he 
received  only  the  title  of  Director  of  Finances  (October, 
1776).  During  five  years  he  bore  himself  with  honor  in  a 
position  which  was  rendered  exceedingly  difficult  by  the 
narrow  and  jealous  character  of  Maurepas,  the  indolence 
of  the  king,  and  the  cupidity  of  the  courtiers.  He  had  to 
make  good  the  deficit  which  Turgot  had  only  had  time  to 
diminish,  and  to  provide  for  the  costs  of  the  American  war 


CHAP.  XXX.]         ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  513 

and  for  the  enormous  expenses  of  a  court  encumbered  with 
a  host  of  officers  of  every  title  and  of  servants  of  every 
description.  This  he  succeeded  in  doing  without  augment- 
ing the  taxes  and  without  largely  economizing  upon  the 
court,  but  by  reduction  in  the  costs  of  collection,  by  a  thou- 
sand small  but  useful  reforms,  and  by  loans  amounting  to 
400,000,000  francs,  which  were  for  the  most  part  placed  as 
life  annuities.  It  was  well  to  make  an  appeal  to  public 
credit,  but  borrowing  on  onerous  terms  was  deferring  and 
not  solving  the  difficulty ;  so  under  this  honest  administra- 
tion of  a  skillful  banker  who  was  not  a  great  minister  the 
gulf  continued  to  deepen.  In  order  to  fill  it  Necker 
counted  upon  peace,  upon  the  future;  but  who  is  master  of 
what  is  to  come? 

Necker  fell  two  years  before  the  end  of  the  war.  The 
occasion  of  his  fall  was  his  famous  "Account  Rendered  of 
the  Financial  Condition,"  published  in  1781,  which  made 
so  much  noise,  and  yet  which  was  so  incomplete,  as  it  showed 
only  receipts  and  ordinary  expenses.  In  it  no  word  was 
said  concerning  loans  or  expenses  for  war.  In  it  the 
receipts  appeared  greater  than  the  expenses  by  10,000,000 
francs.  The  public,  charmed  that  from  its  eyes  was  lifted 
even  a  corner  of  the  thick  veil  which  concealed  the  finances, 
welcomed  this  publication  with  immense  applause.  The 
capitalists  loaned  the  minister  236,000,000  francs.  But  the 
court  was  irritated  at  this  appeal  to  public  spirit.  If  day- 
light was  poured  upon  the  financial  administration,  what 
would  become  of  pensions  and  of  all  the  customary  pillage? 
In  the  presence  of  the  clamors  of  the  court  Louis  XVI. 
once  more  yielded;  when  Necker,  with  exhausted  patience, 
tendered  his  resignation  it  was  accepted  by  the  king  (May 
21,  1781).  Besides  these  financial  reforms,  some  honorable 
acts  had  signalized  his  administration ;  he  had  emancipated 
the  serfs  of  the  royal  domain,  had  abolished  the  right  of 
mortgage  which  gave  up  to  the  lord  all  the  property  acquired 
by  his  fugitive  serf  in  a  foreign  country,  and  had  done 
away  with  preliminary  torture. 

In  the  American  war  France  aided  the  ascent  of  a  new 
people  to  a  place  among  the  nations.  Other  acts  indicated 
the  influence  which  was  returning  to  her.  By  her  subsidies 
to  Sweden,  by  her  openly  expressed  intention  of  supporting 
Gustavus  III.,  she  arrested  the  shameless  ambition  of 
Prussia  and  Russia;  on  the  other  hand,  she  contributed  to 


514  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION.          [BOOK  VII. 

rescue  Bavaria  from  the  attacks  of  Austria,  and  to  save  the 
empire  from  a  war  between  the  two  great  German  powers 
by  causing  her  mediation  and  that  of  Russia  to  be  accepted 
by  Austria  and  Prussia  at  the  Congress  of  Teschen  (1779). 
Her  diplomacy  was  therefore  as  happy  as  her  arms. 

But  victory  is  costly,  and  the  financial  administration  had 
fallen  into  the  hands  of  the  incapable  Joly  de  Fleury,  and 
then  into  those  of  the  wasteful  Calonne,  who  in  three  years 
and  in  time  of  peace  obtained  loans  to  the  amount  of  500,- 
000,000  francs.  The  situation  became  worse  instead  of 
better,  and  the  moment  came  when  all  must  be  revealed  to 
the  king.  Then  the  prodigal  became  a  reformer.  Calonne 
devised  a  plan  wherein  were  mingled  the  ideas  of  all  his 
predecessors;  he  proposed  to  subject  the  privileged  classes 
to  the  impost  and  to  a  land  assessment,  to  establish  pro- 
vincial assemblies,  to  diminish  the  villain  tax,  and  to  give 
freedom  to  trade  in  grain.  An  assembly  of  notables,  con- 
vened (February  22,  1787)  in  order  to  discuss  these  pro- 
posals, received  them  with  marked  disfavor;  Calonne  fell, 
but  the  deficit  was  not  made  good. 

Brienne,  Archbishop  of  Toulouse,  an  ambitious  and 
brilliant  schemer,  who  mingled  business  and  pleasures,  was 
chosen  to  replace  him,  but  was  not  more  skillful.  Parlia- 
ment refused  to  register  the  edicts  which  established  new 
taxes,  and  declared  that  deputies  of  the  nation  alone  had  the 
right  of  consenting  to  such  impost.  Louis  XVI.  in  a  bed 
of  justice  forced  the  hand  of  Parliament,  and  that  body  was 
once  more  exiled.  But  disturbances  broke  out  everywhere. 
Brienne,  at  the  end  of  his  resources,  convoked  the  States 
General  for  a  meeting,  May  i,  1789.  A  second  assembly 
of  notables,  called  to  decide  what  should  be  the  representa- 
tion of  the  nobility,  clergy,  and  third  estate,  decided  in 
favor  of  equality  in  the  number  of  deputies  from  each 
order.  This  would  give  the  majority  to  the  two  privileged 
classes.  Public  opinion  became  indignant;  Necker, 
recalled  to  the  ministry  of  finance,  decided  the  king  to 
declare  of  his  sovereign  authority  that  the  deputies  of  the 
third  estate  should  be  equal  in  number  to  those  of  the  other 
two  orders.  The  French  Revolution  was  begun  (1789). 

By  recapitulating  the  sum  total  of  this  chapter  we  see 
that  under  the  pressure  of  French  ideas  the  spirit  of  reform 
had  gained  possession  of  all  Europe.  The  princes  volun- 
tarily put  themselves  at  the  head  of  the  movement.  They 


CHAP.  XXX.]         ATTEMPTS  AT  REFORM.  515 

wished  to  suppress  abuses,  to  destroy  privileges,  and  to 
bestow  welfare  upon  their  peoples.  But  these  reforms  were 
in  purely  material  affairs,  and  they  tended  much  more  to 
increase  the  revenues  and  the  power  of  the  monarchs  than 
to  raise  the  moral  level  and  the  political  condition  of  the 
subjects;  hence  they  were  powerless  in  the  majority  of  the 
states,  because  the  governments  took  no  thought  for  their 
own  reformation,  and  because,  through  lack  of  good  institu- 
tions, everything  still  depended  upon  the  hazard  of  royal 
birth,  which  might  make  the  absolute  power  pass  from  the 
hands  of  an  intelligent  prince  to  those  of  one  incapable. 
Under  Charles  IV.  and  Godoy  Spain  fell  back  almost  as 
low  as  under  Charles  II.  The  time  of  the  lazzarone  flour- 
ished at  Naples  anew  under  Queen  Caroline  and  her  minister 
Acton.  Joseph  II.  agitated  but  did  not  regenerate  Aus- 
tria. Already  it  has  been  seen  what  Catherine  II.  thought 
of  reforms  for  her  people.  In  Prussia  alone  a  great  man 
did  great  things;  and  in  France,  since  skillful  ministers 
who  wished  to  do  them  did  not  succeed,  the  nation  took 
their  accomplishment"  upon  itself. 


THE    END. 


CHRONOLOGICAL  LIST 


OF  THE 


Popes,  Emperors,  and  Princes  who  reigned  in  the 
Principal  States  between  1453  and 

Popes. 


NICHOLAS  V.,     . 
CALIXTUS  II.  (Borgia), 
Pius  II.  (Aneas  Silvius  Piccolo- 
mini),    . 
PAUL  II., 

SlXTUS  IV., 

INNOCENT  VIII., 

ALEXANDER  VI.  (Borgia), 

Pius  III.,      . 

JULIUS  II.  (della  Rovere), 

LEO  X.  (de  Medici), 

ADRIAN  VI., 

CLEMENT  VII.  (de  Medici), 

PAUL  III.  (Farnese),      . 

JULIUS  III.,  . 

MARCELLUS  II., 

PAUL  IV.  (Caraffa), 

Pius  IV., 

PiusV., 

GREGORY  XIII., 

SlXTUSV.,      . 

URBAN  VII.,      . 


HENRY  VI., 
(dethroned  1461) 

House  of  York. 
EDWARD  IV.,     . 
EDWARD  V., 
RICHARD  III.,    . 
(dethroned  1485) 

House  of  the  Tudor s. 
HENRY  VII.,      . 
HENRY  VIII., 
EDWARD  VI., 


ir  of                                                              Year  of 

ssion                                                                acce 

ssion 

1447 

GREGORY  XIV., 

1590 

1455 

INNOCENT  IX., 

1591 

CLEMENT  VIII., 

1592 

H58 

LEO  XI., 

1605 

1464 

PAUL  V.  (Borghese),     . 

1605 

1471 

GREGORY  XV., 

1621 

1484 

URBAN  VIII.  (Barberini), 

1623 

1492 

INNOCENT  X., 

1644 

1503 

ALEXANDER  VII.  (Chigi), 

l6S5 

1503 

CLEMENT  IX., 

1667 

1513 

CLEMENT  X.,     . 

1670 

1522 

INNOCENT  XI., 

1676 

J523 

ALEXANDER  VIII., 

1689 

1524 

INNOCENT  XII., 

1691 

1550 

CLEMENT  XL,    . 

1700 

J555 

INNOCENT  XIII., 

1721 

1555 

BENEDICT  XIII., 

1724 

1559 

CLEMENT  XII., 

1730 

1566 

BENEDICT  XIV., 

1740 

J572 

CLEMENT  XIII. 

1758 

1585 

CLEMENT  XIV.  (Ganganelli), 

1769 

IS90 

Pius  VI., 

1775 

England. 

1422      JANE  GREY, 

1553 

MARY  I., 

1553 

ELIZABETH, 

1558 

1461 

House  of  the  Stuarts. 

1483 
1483 

JAMES  I.  (King  of  Scotland 
after  1567), 

1603 

From   this   time   England  and 

Scotland   had  the  same  sov- 

1485 

ereigns,    though    the    official 

1509 

union   took  place  so  late  as 

1547            *ay  J>  I7°7- 

Si* 


CHRONOLOGICAL   LIST. 


England. — Continued. 


Year  of 

accession 

CHARLES  I.,  .  .  1625 

(beheaded  1649) 

REPUBLIC,  .  .  1649-1660 
OLIVER  CROMWELL  (Protector),  1653 
RICHARD  CROMWELL,  "  1658 

(resigned  1659) 

CHARLES  II.,      .  .  .  1660 

JAMES  II.,      .  .  .        ^85 

(deposed  1688) 


WILLIAM  HI.  and  MARY  II, 
(Mary  II.  died  1694) 

House  of  Hanover. 

GEORGE  I., 
GEORGE  II.,  . 
GEORGE  III., 


Year  of 
accession 


1727 


France. 


CHARLES  VII.,  . 
Louis  XL,     . 
CHARLES  VIII., 


1422 
1461 
1483 


Branch  of  Orleans. 
Louis  XII.,   .  .  .         1498 

Branch  of  Angouleme. 
FRANCIS  I. ,  .  .  1515 

HENRY  II.,    .  ...        1547 


FRANCIS  II., 
CHARLES  IX., 
HENRY  III., 

Branch  of  the  Bourbons. 
HENRY  IV., 
Louis  XIII., 
Louis  XIV., 
Louis  XV.,   . 
Louis  XVI., 


1550 
1560 
1574 

1589 
1610 

1643 
1715 

1774 


Emperors  of  Germany. 


FREDERICK  III.,  .           .  1440 

MAXIMILIAN  I.,        .  .        1493 

CHARLES  V.,     .  .           .  1519 

(abdicated  in  1556) 

FERDINAND  I.,          .  .        1558 

(King   of   Hungary  and   Bo- 
hemia after  1527) 

MAXIMILIAN  II.,  .            .  1564 

RUDOLPH  II.,           .  .        1576 

MATHIAS,            .  .            .  1612 

FERDINAND  II.,        .  .        1619 

LEOPOLD  I.,  .           .  1658 

JOSEPH  I.,     .           .  .        1705 


CHARLES  VI.,     .  .  .  1711 

(died  1740) 

CHARLES  VII.  (Albert  of  Ba- 
varia), .  .  .  1742 

The  Austro  -  Lorraine  branch 
commences  with  Francis  I., 
Duke  of  Lorraine,  husband  of 
Maria  Theresa,  daughter  of 
Charles  VI.,  .  .  .  1745 

JOSEPH  II.,    .  .  .        1765 

(he  became  sovereign  of  Aus- 
tria only  at  death  of   Maria 
Theresa  in  1780) 


Naples. 


ALPHONSO  I.,     . 
FERDINAND  I., 
ALPHONSO  II.,    . 
FERDINAND  II., 
FREDERICK  III., 
FERDINAND  THE  CATHOLIC, 


H35 
1458 
1494 

1495 
1496 

1504 


From  that  time  till  1713  the 
kings  of  Spain  were  also  kings 
of  Naples. 

EMPEROR  CHARLES  VI.,  King 
of  Naples  from  .  .  .  1713 

DON  CARLOS,  .  .        1735 

FERDINAND  III.,  .  .  1759 


Ottoman  Empire. 


MOHAMMED  II., 
BAIEZID  II.,  . 
SELIM  I., 
SOULEIMAN  I.. 
SELIM  II.,       '    . 


1481 
.  1512 

1520 
.  1566 


MOURAD    III., 

MOHAMMED  III. 
ACHMET  I., 

MUSTAPHA  I., 
OSMAN  II., 


1574 

J595 
1603 
1617 
1617 


CHRONOLOGICAL  LIST. 


5'9 


Ottoman  Empire. — Continued. 


Year  of                                                                   Year  of 

accession                                                                acce 

ssion 

MUSTAPHA  I.  (a  second  time),  .   1622 

ACHMET  III.,      . 

I7°3 

MOURAD  IV.,             .            .         1623 

MAHMOUD  I.,            . 

1730 

IBRAHIM,            .           .           .  1639 

OSMAN  III., 

1754 

MOHAMMED  IV.,       .           .        1649 

MUSTAPHA  III., 

1757 

SOULEIMAN  II.,  .           .            .  1687 

ABD-UL  HAMID  \., 

1774 

ACHMET  II.,                   .                .            1691 

SELIM  III.,    . 

1789 

MUSTAPHA  II.,   .           .           .  1695 

Poland. 

CASIMIR  IV.,      .           .           .  1445 

VLADISLAUS  (son  of  preceding), 

1632 

JOHN  I.  (Albert),      .            .        1492 

JOHN  CASIMIR  (brother  of  pre- 

ALEXANDER I.,  .           .           .  1501 

ceding), 

1648 

SIGISMUND  I.,           .           .        1506 

MICHAEL  VIECNIOVIECSKI, 

1669 

SlGISMUND  II.  (Augustus),          .    1548 

JOHN  SOBIESKI, 

1674 

HENRY  (Henry  III.  of  France),  1572 

AUGUSTUS  II.  (of  Saxony), 

1697 

STEPHEN   BATHORI  (of  Tran- 

STANISLAUS LECZINSKI, 

1704 

sylvania),         .            .            .  1575 

AUGUSTUS  III., 

1733 

SIGISMUND  III.  (of  Sweden),       1587 

PONIATOWSKI,     . 

1764 

Prussia. 

FREDERICK  I.,   .           .           .  1701 

FREDERICK  WILLIAM  I., 

1713 

(was  Frederick  III.  as  Elector 

FREDERICK  II.  (the  Great), 

1740 

of  Brandenburg)                                      FREDERICK  WILLIAM  II., 

1786 

Russia. 

VASILI  III.   (Grand    Duke  of               ALEXIS,  .... 

i64S 

Moscow),          .            .            .  1423 

FEODOR  II.,  . 

1676 

IVAN  III.  (the  Great),          .        1462 

IVAN    V.  and    PETER    I,   (the 

VASILI  IV.,        .            .            .  1505 

Great), 

1682 

IVAN  IV.  (the  Terrible),       .         1533 

(Ivan  died  1696) 

(took  title  of  Czar  1547) 

CATHERINE  I., 

1725 

FEODOR  I.,                     .           .  1584 

PETER  II., 

1727 

(with  him  the  race  of  Ruric 

ANNE, 

1730 

became  extinct  in  1598) 

IVAN  VI., 

1740 

BORIS  GODOUNOFF,       .            .  1598 

ELIZABETH,  . 

1741 

(died  1605) 

PETER  III., 

1762 

Interregnum   and    troubles    till 

CATHERINE  II.  (the  Great), 

1762 

house  of  Romanoff  succeeded, 

fojnded  by  Michael,  .            .  1613 

Sardinia. 

VICTOR  AMADEUS   II.  (Prince 

CHARLES  EMMANUEL  III., 

1730 

of    Piedmont,    and    Duke   of 

VICTOR  AMADEUS  III., 

1773 

Savoy  1675),  became  King  of 

Sardinia,          .            .             .  1715 

Scotland. 

JAMES  II.,           .           .           .  1437 

JAMES  VI., 

1567 

JAMES  III.,    .           .           .        146° 

(became  King  of  England  in 

JAMES  IV.,                      .            .  1488 

1603,  since  which  time  Scot- 

JAMES V.,                 .           .        1513 

land   and  England  have  tne 

MARY  STUART,  .           .           .  1542 

same  sovereign) 

520 


CHRONOLOGICAL   LIST. 


Spain. 


Year  of 
accession 
Kingdom  of  Ar agon. 

ALPHONSO  V.,    .          .  .  1416 

JOHN  II.,       .  .  .        1455 

(King  of  Navarre  through  his 
wife  after  1425) 

FERDINAND  II.  (the  Catholic),  1479 
(married  to  the  Queen  of  Cas- 
tile in  1469) 

Kingdoms  of  Castile  and  Leon. 
JOHN  II.,  .  .  .  1406 

HENRY  IV.,  .  .          .       1454 

ISABELLA  I.,  .  .  1474 

JANE  THE  FOOLISH,  .        1504 

(daughter  of  Isabella  I.  and 

of  Ferdinand  II.  the  Catholic, 

King  of  Aragon) 
United  Crowns  of  Aragon,    Castile. 

and  Leon,  or  Kingdom  of  Spain. 
FERDINAND  II.  (the  Catholic),    1500 


Year  of 
accession 

(King  of  Aragon  since  1479  ; 

as  Ferdinand  V.  in  Castile ; 

and  conqueror  of  Navarre  in 

1512) 

CHARLES  I.,                   .  .  1516 

(son  of  Jane  the  Foolish,  and 

emperor  as  Charles  V.,  .  1519 

PHILIP  II.,     .           .  .        1556 

PHILIP  III.,        .            .  .  1598 

PHILIP  IV.,  .            .  .        1621 

CHARLES  II.,      .           .  .  1665 

House  of  Bourbon. 

PHILIP  V.,          .  .           .  1700 

(abdicated  1724) 

Louis  I.,  .            .        1724 
PHILIP  V.  (the  second  time),    .  1724 

FERDINAND  VI.,  .           .        1746 

CHARLES  III.,    .  .           .  1759 

CHARLES  IV.,  .           .        1788 


Sweden. 


House  of  Vasa. 
GUSTAVUS  I.  (Vasa),    . 
ERIC  XIV.,    . 
JOHN  III., 

SlGISMUND,     . 

CHARLES  IX.,    . 
GUSTAVUS  II.  (Adolphus), 
CHRISTINA, 


•  1523 
1560 

.  1568 
1592 

.  1600 
1611 

.  1632 


CHARLES  X.  (Gustavus),  .  1654 

CHARLES  XI.,          .  .        1660 

CHARLES  XII.,  .           .  .  1697 

ULRICA  ELEANORA,  .        1719 

FREDERICK  I.,   .           .  .  1721 

ALPHONSO  FREDERICK,  .        1751 

GUSTAVUS  III.,  .           .  .  1771 


INDEX. 


ACUNHA,  NUNO  D',  conquest  of  Diu  by, 
1531,  122 

Adanson,  Michel,  476 

Addison,  Joseph,  379 

Africa,  Portuguese  colonies  in,  sixteenth 
century,  129  ;  Portuguese  exploration 
in,  fifteenth  century,  119 

Agnadel,  battle  of,  1509,  85 

Agriculture  in  France  during  the  eigh- 
teenth century,  495 

Aigues-Mortes,  interview  of  Charles  V. 
and  Francis  I.  at,  1538,  106 

Aix-la-Chapelle,  peace  of,  1748,  421,  438 

Alais,  peace  of,  1629,  261 

Albania,  conquest  of,  by  Mohammed 
II.,  70 

Alberoni,  Giulio,  Spanish  minister, 
downfall  of,  402 

Albuquerque,  A.  de,  exploits  of,  in 
India,  1507-12,  121  ;  Hindu  vener- 
ation for,  122 

Alenc.on,  John  of  Valois,  Duke  of,  im- 
prisonment and  death  of,  20 

Alexander  VI.,  Pope,  65  ;  submission  of, 
to  Charles  VIII.  of  France,  78 

Alexis  Petrovich,  Czarevitch,  rebellion 
and  death  of,  398 

Algiers,  submission  of,  to  the  Ottomans, 
1518,  73 

Almagro,  companion  of  Pizarro,  rebellion 
and  execution  of,  128 

Almeida,  Francisco  d',  first  Portuguese 
viceroy  of  India,  121 

Alphonso  of  Castile  proclaimed  King  of 
Spain,  42 

Alphonso  V.,  King  of  Portugal,  Louis  XI. 
of  France  and,  49 

Alsace,  cession  of,  to  France,  1648,  284  ; 
defeat  of  the  allies  in,  by  Turenne, 

l675i  342 

Alva,  Duke  of,  barbarities  of,  in  the 
Netherlands,  1567-73,  208  ;  submission 
of  Rome  to,  1557,  114 

Amboise,  conspiracy  of,  1560,  218  ; 
treaty  of,  1563,  222 

America,  discovery  of,  by  Columbus, 
1492,  124  ;  first  exports  of,  131  ;  Span- 
ish colonies  in,  sixteenth  century,  129  ; 
Vespucci  and.  125 

American  revolution,  France  and,  451  ; 
opening  of,  449  ;  results  of,  455 


Amyot  and  the  literature  of  the  sixteenth 
century, 144 

Anabaptists,  outrages  by,  in  the  Nether- 
lands, 168  ;  rise  of,  166 

Andrea  of  Pisa,  Italian  sculptor,  148 

Andrussow,  treaty  of,  1667,  327 

Anglicanism.     See  CHURCH  OF  ENGLAND 

Anjou,  Francis,  Duke  of,  military  opera- 
tions of,  in  1569,  224 

Anne,  Czarina  of  Russia,  reign  of,  457 

Anne,  Queen  of  Great  Britain,  accession 
of,  1702,  358  ;  reign  of,  434 

Anne  of  Austria,  Queen-regent  of  France, 
Cardinal  Mazarin  and,  311 

Anne  of  Beaujeu  and  Maximilian  of 
Germany,  25  ;  regency  of,  24 

Anne  of  Brittany,  marriage  of,  to  Charles 
VIII.  of  France,  26 

Antilles,  discovery  of,  by  Columbus, 
1493,  125 

Antome,  Jacques  D.,  architectural  work 
of,  482 

Arabia,  submission  of,  to  the  Ottomans, 

1517.  73 

Aragon  and  Castile,  union  of,  43 
Aranda,  Pedro  P.,  Count  of,  ministry  of, 

5°3 

Architecture  in  France  in  the  sixteenth 
century,  155  ;  in  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury, 377  ;  new  school  of,  in  Italy,  in 
the  sixteenth  century,  147 

Argyle,  Archibald  Campbell,  Earl  of,  in- 
vasion of  Scotland  by,  1685,  352 

Ariosto's  "  Orlando  Furioso,  and  Boi- 
ardo's  "  Orlando  Inamorato,"  142 

Aristotle  and  Plato  in  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury, 141 

Aries,  capture  of,   by   Charles  V.,  1536, 

i°5 

Armada,  Spanish,  failure  of,  1588,  217 
Armagnac,  John   V.,  Count   of,    terrible 

punishment   of,  and   his  relatives,   by 

Louis  XL,  20 
Arnauld,  Antoine,  theological  works  of, 

Arras,  capture  of,  by  the  French,  1640, 
280  ;  treaty  of,  1482,  23 

Art  in  Europe  in  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury, 381 

Art  in  France,  Colbert  as  the  patron 
°f>  337 !  Henry  IV.  as  the  patron 


521 


522 


INDEX. 


of,  252  ;  in  the  sixteenth  century,  15^  ; 
in  the  seventeenth  century,  365 ;  in 
the  eighteenth  century,  482 

Art  in  Germany  during  the  Renais- 
sance, 156 

Art  in  Italy,  causes  of  rapid  decline  in, 
154 

Astronomical  discoveries  in  the  seven- 
teenth century,  384 

Astronomy,  Copernicus  and  the  develop- 
ment of,  158 

Augsburg,  diet  and  confession  of,  1530, 
167  ;  interim  of,  1548,  170  ;  League  of, 
against  Louis  XIV.,  1686,  346;  war  of. 
League  of,  355  ;  peace  of,  1555,  171  ; 
ecclesiastical  reservations  of  peace  of, 
268 

Augustus  II.,  King  of  Poland,  death  of, 
407  ;  reinstatement  of,  393  ;  renounces 
his  throne  in  favor  of  Leczinski,  1706, 

3?.1 

Aulic  Council,  founding  of,  by  the 
Emperor  Maximilian,  54 

Austria,  acquisition  of  territory  by,  under 
the  Emperor  Maximilian,  55 ;  and 
France,  opening  of  the  conflict  be- 
tween, 1519,  91  ;  at  the  opening  of  the 
Thirty  Years'  War,  270  ;  at  the  close  of 
the  seventeenth  century,  357  ;  decline 
of,  in  the  eighteenth  century.  413  ; 
designs  of  France  against,  1740,  415  ; 
Henry  IV.  of  France  and,  251  ;  reforms 
in,  in  the  eighteenth  century,  506 ; 
Turkey  and,  war  between,  1787,  507 

Austrian  succession,  war  of,  414 

Aveni,  defeat  of  the  Spaniards  at,  by  the 
French,  1635,  279 

Azores,  discovery  of,  by  the  Portuguese, 
1431,  120 

BABINGTON,  ANTHONY,  execution  of,  1586, 

216 
Bacon,    F.,    "  Novum    Organum,"    380 ; 

works  of,  244 

Bade,  Josse,  early  publisher  of  Paris,  139 
Bahamas,  discovery    of,    by   Columbus, 

1492,  125 

Baiezid  II.,  Sultan  of  the  Ottomans,  71 
Bailly,  Jejin  S.,  473 
Balboa,  survey  of  isthmus  of  Panama  by, 

1513,  126 

Balzac,  Honore  de,  works  of,  366 
Baner,  John  G.,  military  successes  of,  280 
Banks,  development  of,  in  the  sixteenth 

century,  137 

Bar,  Confederation  of,  1768,  463 
Barbarelli,  Giorgione,  works  of,  152 
Barbaroussa,    Ottoman    pirate,    raTages 

of,  in  the  Mediterranean,  103 
Barnabite  order,  creation  of,  192 
Barry,  Marie  J.,  Countess  of,  510 
Bart,  Jean,  naval  exploits  of,  361,  362 
Basement  Club,  499 
Batavians,  Belgians  and,  union  of,  1576, 

205 ;    Walloon   provinces   and,   conflict 

between,  1577-81,  210 
Battle  of  the  Spurs.  1513,  87 
Bavaria,  succession   of,  purchase  of,  by 

Maria  Theresa,  1777,  433 


Bayard,  Pierre  du  Terrail,  Chevalier, 
death  of,  94  ;  defense  of  Mezieres  by, 
1521,  93  ;  Italian  campaigns  of,  83,  87 

Bayle,  Pierre,  works  of,  373 

Beaton,  Cardinal,  assassination  of,  1546, 
179 

Beaufort,  Francois  de  Vend6me,  Duke 
of,  military  operations  and  death  of,  339 

Beauvais,  gallant  defense  of,  1472,  17 

"  Bed  of  justice,"  406 

Belgians,  Batavians  and,  union  of,  1576, 
205 

Belgrade,  peace  of,  409  ;  siege  of,  by 
Mohammed  II.,  52,  69 

Belle  Isle,  Charles  L.  A.  Fouquet,  Count 
of,  schemes  of,  against  Austria,  1740, 
415  ;  retreat  of,  from  Prague,  1742,  417 

Belle  Isle,  battle  near,  1747,  420 

Bellini,  Giovanni,  master  of  Barbarelli 
and  Titian,  152  ;  and  the  colorist 
school  of  painting,  149 

Bembo,  Cardinal,  influence  of,  upon 
Italian  literature,  141  ;  on  the  condition 
of  the  clergy  before  the  Reformation, 
161 

Bentivoglio,  Guido,  380 

Bernard,  St.,  on  the  condition  of  the 
Church  before  the  Reformation,  161 

Bernhard,  Duke  of  Saxe-Weimar,  mili- 
tary success  of,  279 

Bernouilli,  Jacques  and  John,  385 

Berthollet,  Claude  L.,  Count,  chemical 
work  of,  475 

Bethencpurt,  John  of,  conquest  of  the 
Canaries  by,  1402,  119 

Beza,  Theodore,  severe  doctrines  of,  175 

Bibbiena,  Cardinal,  "  Calandra,"  142 

Bible,  Luther's  translation  of,  165,  166 

Bill  of  Six  Articles,  1539,  181 

Bills  of  exchange,  first  use  of.  137 

Biren,  John  E.  de,  Duke  of  Courland, 
infamous  career  of,  457 

Biron,  Armand  de  Gontaut,  Baron  de, 
Marshal  of  France,  conspiracy  of,  1600, 
251 

Black,  Joseph,  chemical  work  of,  475 

Blanc,  Cape,  first  passage  of,  by  the  Por- 
tuguese, 1444,  120 

Blenheim,  or  Hochstedt,  battles  of,  1703, 

„  1704,  359. 

Blois,  treaties  of,  1504,  1505,  83 

Bocold,  John,  Anabaptist  leader,  168 

Boehme,  Jakob,  379 

Boerhaave,  Hermann,  385 

Bogesund,  battle  of,  1520,  171 

Bohemia,  Catholic  restoration  in,  1620, 
terrible  effects  of.  273  ;  and  Hungary, 
struggles  of,  against  Austria,  in  the 
fifteenth  century,  51 

Boiardo's  "Orlando  Inamorato,"  and 
Ariosto's  "  Orlando  Furioso,"  142 

Boileau    Despreaux,  Nicolas,   works    of, 

371 
Bojador,  Cape,  first  passage  of,  by  the 

Portuguese,  1433,  120 
Bomb-boats,  invention  of,  1681,  344 
Bonnivet,    Guillaume    G.,    Seigneur   de, 

campaigns  of,  in  Italy,  94 
Books,  earliest  printed,  139 


INDEX. 


523 


Bordeu,  Theophile  de,  scientific  work  of, 
476 

Borgia,  Caesar,  82  ;  crimes  of,  143 

Borromeo.  Charles,  St.,  195 

Bossuet,  Jacques  B.,  Bishop  of  Meaux, 
Bourdaloue  and,  367  ;  on  the  condition 
of  the  Church  before  the  Reformation, 
161,  163 

Bothwell,  John  Hepburn,  Earl  of,  Mary 
Stuart  and,  214 

Bothwell  Bridge,  battle  of,  351 

Boucher,  Jean,  works  of,  483 

Boulogne,  ransom  of,  from  the  English, 
by  Henry  II.,  in 

Bourbon,  Charles,  Duke  of,  Constable  of 
France,  Bayard  and,  94 ;  death  of,  97  ; 
treason  of,  94 

Bourbon,  Louis  H.,  Duke  of,  exile  of, 
407  ;  Marchioness  of  Prie  and,  406 

Bourdaloue,  Louis,  Bossuet  and,  367 

Boyle,  Robert,  385 

Boyne,  battle  of,  1690,  355 

Bradley,  James,  discoveries  by,  473 

Braganza,  house  of,  establishment  of,  on 
the  throne  of  Portugal,  1665,  339 

Bramante  and  Michael  Angelo,  147  ;  and 
the  new  school  of  architecture  in  the 
sixteenth  century,  147 

Brandt,  Sebastian.    "  Bark  of  Fools,"  146 

Brazil,  discovery  of,  by  Cabral,  121  ; 
early  commerce  of,  Portuguese  monop- 
oly of,  131  ;  first  colonists  of,  123 

Breda,  compromise  of,  1566,  208 

Briel,  capture  of,  by  the  "  Beggars," 
1572,  208 

Brienne,  Lomenie  de.  See  LOM£NIE  DE 
BRIENNE 

Brissac,  Charles  de  Cpsse,  Marshal  of 
France,  defense  of  Piedmont  by,  1554, 
112 

Brittany,  Francis  II.,  Duke  of,  25 

Broglie,  Victor  F.,  Duke  of,  Marshal  of 
France,  campaigns  of,  in  the  Seven 
Years'  War,  427 

Brunelleschi  and  the  new  school  of  archi- 
tecture of  the  sixteenth  century,  147 

Bruyere,  Jean  de  la.     "  Characters,"  369 

Buckers,  Haas,  musical  inventions  of, 
156 

Buckingham,  George  Villiers,  Duke  of, 
assassination  of,  1628,  293  ;  disgraceful 
administration  of,  289  ;  impeachment 
of,  1626,  292  ;  James  I.  and,  289 

Buffon,  George  L.  L.,  Count  of,  zoolog- 
ical work  of,  475 

Burgoyne,  General  John,  surrender  of, 
!777>  451 

Burgundy,  Charles  the  Bold,  Duke  of, 
alliance  of,  with  Edward  IV.  of  Eng- 
land, 14;  and  Louis  XL,  12;  in  Lor- 
raine and  Switzerland,  18  ;  last  cam- 
paigns and  death  of,  18,  22 

Burnet,  Gilbert,  380 

CABOT,  JOHN,  discovery  of  Newfound- 
land by,  1497,  128 

Cabot,  Sebastian,  discoveries  by,  128 
Cabral,  Alvarez,  discovery  of  Brazil  by, 

121 


Cadan,  treaty  of,  between  Lutherans  and 
Catholics,  1534,  109,  167 

Cade,  Jack,  Rebellion  of,  29 

Cadiz,  sack  of,  by  the  English,  1596,  218 

Cajetano,  Cardinal,  mission  of,  to  Luther, 
164 

Calais,  capture  of,  by  the  Duke  of  Guise, 
1558,  114 

Calas,  Jean,  execution  of,  496 

Calcutta,  Portuguese  factory  established 
at,  by  Alvarez  Cabral,  121 

Calderon  de  la  Barca,  Pedro,  379 

Calicut.    See  CALCUTTA 

Calmar,  union  of,  restoration  of,  1520, 
171 

Calonne,  Charles  A.  de,   ministry  of,   514 

Calvin,  J.,  and  the  literature  of  the  six- 
teenth century,  145  ;  "  Christian  Insti- 
tutes," influence  of,  177 ;  Geneva 
under,  1540-^64,  175  ;  Luther  and,  187  ; 
severe  doctrines  of,  175 

Calvinism,  doctrines  of,  184  ;  in  France, 
rise  of,  176 ;  in  the  Netherlands, 
Lutheranism  displaced  by,  176 

Camaldules,  order  of,  creation  of,  1522, 
192 

Cambrai,  treaty  of,  1529,  98,  101  ;  vio- 
lation of,  by  Charles  V.,  104 

Camisards,  revolt  of,  359 

Camoens,  Luis  de,  works  of,  379 

Canada,  discovery  of,  by  Jacques  Cartier, 
1534,  128  ;  loss  of,  by  France,  430 

Canals,  development  of,  in  France,  under 
Colbert,  333  ;  with  locks,  invention  of, 
fifteenth  century,  137 

Canaries,  conquest  of,  1402,  119 

Candia,  siege  of,  by  the  Ottomans,  1645- 

69,  324.  339 

Cano,  Melchior  del,  lieutenant  and  suc- 
cessor of  Magellan,  127 

Cardona,  Raymond  de,  defeat  of  the 
French  by,  1512-13,  87 

Carr,  Robert,  favorite  of  James  L,  289 

Cartier,  Jacques,  discovery  of  Canada 
by,  1534,  128  _ 

Cassini,  Domenico,  384 

Castile,  union  of,  with  Aragon,  43  ;  insur- 
rection in,  against  Charles  I.,  1519, 
48 ;  Ximenes  and,  47 

Castro,  John  de,  and  Portuguese  domin- 
ion in  India,  122  ;  death  of,  123 

Cateau-Cambresis,  treaty  of,  1559  ;  mu- 
tual concessions  under,  115 

Catherine  of  Aragon,  divorce  of,  from 
Henry  VIII.,  180 

Catherine  de  Medici,  queen  of  Henry 
II.  of  France,  character  of,  203  ;  edict 
of,  against  Protestantism,  223  ;  Guises 
and,  221  ;  regency  of,  218 

Catherine,  Czarina  of  Peter  the  Great, 
diplomacy  of,  393 

Catherine  II.,  Czarina  of  Russia,  charac- 
ter of,  462.  468  ;  death  of,  468  ;  reforms 
attempted  by,  508  ;  reign  of,  459 

Catholics  and  Protestants,  conflict  be- 
tween, opening  of,  169 

Catholics  in  England,  persecutions  of 
under  Queen  Elizabeth,  216  ;  Test  Bill 
and,  350 


524 


INDEX. 


Catholic  Church,  in  Spanish  and  Portu- 
guese colonies,  133  ;  reform  of,  under 
Pope  Pius  V.,  1566-72,  197  ;  seculari- 
zation of  property  of,  effects  of,  166 

Catholic  League  in  Germany,  formation 
of,  1601),  269 

Catholicism  in  England,  James  II.  and, 
352  ;  under  Mary,  182  ;  in  Scotland) 
downfall  of,  212  ;  renunciation  of,  by 
Edward  VI.,  182 

Cavendish,  Henry,  chemical  work  of,  475 

Cerdagne  and  Roussillon,  surrender  of, 
to  Louis  XI.  of  France,  1462,  n 

Cerisoles,  defeat  of  the  Spaniards  at,  by 
the  Duke  of  Enghien,  1544,  107 

Cervantes,  Miguel  de,  379 

Ceylon,  Portuguese  conquest  of,  1518,  iac 

Champagne,  Philippe  de,  works  of,  375 

Charles  V.,  emperor  of  the  \Vest  (Charles 
I.,  King  of  Spain,),  accession  of,  to  the 
throne  of  Spain,  47  ;  alliance  of,  with 
Andrew  Doria,  98 ;  alliance  of,  with 
Henry  VIII.  of  England,  1543,  107  ; 
and  Francis  I.,  King  of  France,  91  ; 
and  the  interim  of  Augsburg,  170  ;  and 
Soule'iman  I.,  truce  between,  1545, 
109;  colonial  government  under,  130; 
crowned  by  Pope  Clement  VII.,  98; 
destruction  of  Terouanne  by,  1553, 
112;  flight  and  submission  of,  in  ; 
insurrection  against,  in  Castile,  1519, 
48  ;  invasion  of  France  by,  1544,  108  ; 
invasion  of  Provence  by,  1536,  104  ; 
league  of  Smalkalde  against,  1532,  102  ; 
monopoly  in  the  African  slave  trade 
granted  by,  1517,  132  ;  narrow  escape 
of,  from  Maurice  of  Saxony,  170; 
Netherlands  under,  207 ;  papacy  and, 
in  1541,  190;  perfidy  and  cruelty  of, 
to  German  Protestant  princes,  no; 
Philip  II.  and,  "239;  policy  of,  toward 
the  Reformation,  167,169,  176;  Pope 
Leo  X.  declares  for,  93  ;  relinquish  ment 
of  his  crowns  by,  1556,  112;  siege  of 
Magdeburg  by,  170  ;  siege  of  Metz  by, 
1552,  112  ;  surrender  of  Piedmont  to, 
104 ;  violation  of  treaty  of  Cambrai 
by,  104 

Charles  VI.,  Emperor  of  the  West, 
accession  of,  1711,  360;  "pragmatic' 
of,  1713,  414  ;  succession  of,  414 

Charles  VII.,  King  of  France,  progress  of 
royal  authority  in  last  years  of,  8 

Charles  VIII.,  King  of  France,  character 
of,  81  ;  Italian  expedition  of,  1494,  76; 
Ludovico  Sforza  and,  78  ;  marriage  of, 
to  Anne  of  Brittany,  26  ;  Naples  sub- 
mits to,  1495,  79  ;  reign  of,  24 ;  retreat 
of,  from  Italy,  79  ;  Rome  submits  to, 
1494,  78  •  Savonarola  and,  78 

Charles  IX.,  King  of  France,  brief  reign 
of,  203 ;  character  of,  225 :  Coligny 
and,  226 ;  under  the  regency  of  his 
mother,  219 

Charles  I.,  King  of  England,  accession 
of,  1625,  291  ;  civil  war  under,  298  ;  final 
defeat  of,  at  Naseby,  1645,  300  ;  Parlia- 
ment and,  conflict  between,  292  ;  reign 
of,  292  ;  surrender  of,  by  the  Scotch, 


1647,  301  ;  trial  and  execution  of,  1649, 
302  ;  tyrannical  government  of,  294 

Charles  II..  King  of  England,  coronation 
of,  as  King  of  Scotland,  (651,  305  ; 
emigration  encouraged  by,  447  ;  Louis 
XIV.  and,  alliance  between,  349  ; 
recall  of,  1660,  310  ;  Whigs  and,  350 

Charles  II.,  King  of  Spain,  succession  of, 
357 

Charles  III.,  King  of  Spain,  reforms 
attempted  under,  503 

Charles  IV.,  King  of  Spain,  reign  of,  504 

Charles  Gustavus,  King  of  Sweden, 
defense  of  Warsaw  by,  325 ;  invasion 
of  Denmark  by,  1658,  326 

Charles  XII.,  King  of  Sweden,  accession 
of,  1697,  390  ;  alliance  of,  with  the 
Cossacks  under  Mazeppa,  1708,  392  ; 
character  of,  390;  death  of,  1718,  395  ; 
Frederick  William  I.  of  Prussia  and, 
412  ;  military  achievements  of,  390 ; 
overthrow  of,  by  Peter  the  Great,  1709, 
393  ;  residence  of,  in  Turkey,  394 

Charles  the  Bold,  Duke  of  Burgundy. 
See  BTRGUNDV 

Charles  Stuart,  the  Pretender,  defeat  of, 
at  Culloden,  1746,  419 

Chateaubriant,  edict  of,  against  the 
Protestants,  1551,  17* 

Chateauroux,  Marie  A.  de  Nesles,  Duch- 
ess of,  Louis  XV.  and,  417,  418 

Chatham,  William  Pitt,  Earl  of,  Fred- 
erick the  Great  and,  426  ;  ministry  of, 
438 

Cheracco,  peace  of,  265 

Chevert,  Francois  de,  surrender  of  Prague 
by,  1743,  417 

Cheselden,  \Villiam,  477 

Choiseul,  Etienne  F.  de,  Duke  of,  min- 
istry of,  431,  509 

Choisy,  Francois  T.  de.  Abbe.  "Me- 
moirs," 369 

Christian  II.,  King  of  Denmark  and  Nor- 
way, deposition  of,  1523,  171  ;  Philip 
II.  and,  238  ;  seizure  of  crown  of  Sweden 
by,  171 

Christian  III.,  King  of  Denmark,  Protes- 
tant reforms  under,  173 

Christian  IV.,  King  of  Denmark,  inva- 
sion of  Germany  by,  1625,  273 

Christian  of  Brunswick,  defeat  of,  by 
Tilly,  1622,  273 

Church,  condition  of,  at  the  opening  of 
the  Reformation,  161 

Church  of  England,  doctrines  of,  185 ; 
organization  of,  1562,  183 

Cinq-Mars,  Henri  Coiffier,  Marquis  of, 
conspiracy  and  execution  of,  1642,  263 

Cities  of  safety,  in  France,  under  the 
treaty  of  St.  Germain,  1570.  225 

Clairaut,  Alexis  C.,  astronomical  work 
of,  472 

Clarence,  Duke  of,  brother  of  Edward 
IV.  of  England,  32 

Clarendon,  Edward  Hyde,  Earl  of,  380 

Clarke,  Samuel,  381 

Clement  VII.,  Pope,  accession  of.  96; 
coronation  of  Charles  V.  by,  98  ;  death 
of,  102 


INDEX. 


S'S 


Clergy,  disorders  among,  at  the  time  of 
the  Reformation,  161,  162 

Clermont,  Louis  de  Bourbon-Conde, 
Count  of,  campaigns  of,  in  the  Seven 
Years'  War.  427 

Clinton,  Sir  Henry,  campaigns  of,  in  the 
American  revolution,  452 

Clive,  Robert,  Lord,  conquest  of  India 
by,  443  :  death  of,  1774,  444 

Colbert,  Jean  B.,  death  of,  1683,  346  ; 
financial  administration  of,  331 

Coligny,  Gaspard  de,  Admiral,  attempted 
assassination  of ,  227  ;  character  of,  224  ; 
Charles  IX.  and,  226 ;  defense  of  St. 
Quentin  by,  1557,  114  ;  expedition  of, 
to  the  Netherlands,  225  ;  military  opera- 
tions of,  in  1569,  224 

Colombia,  discovery  of,  by  Columbus, 
1502,  125 

Colonies,  North  American,  government 
of,  447 

Colonial  congress,  first,  1765,  440 

Colonization  by  European  nations,  nature 
and  results  of,  129,  136 

Colonna,  Prosper,  capture  of,  at  Villa- 
franca,  89 

Columbus,  Christopher,  and  the  route  to 
India,  123  ;  discovery  of  America  by, 
1492,  124 ;  disgrace  and  death  of,  125  ; 
voyages  of,  1492-1502,  125 

Commerce,  French,  development  of, 
under  Colbert,  334  ;  progress  of,  under 
Henry  IV.,  249 ;  of  Holland,  progress 
of,  in  the  sixteenth  century,  245 

Compiegne,  castle  of,  imprisonment  of 
Marie  de  Medici  at,  261 

Concino  Concini,  Marshal  d'Ancre,  career 
of,  in  France,  256  ;  Henri,  Prince  of 
Conde,  and,  257  ;  murder  of,  1617,  258 

Concordat  of  1516  between  Leo  X.  and 
Francis  I.  of  France,  89 

Conde,  Henri,  Prince  of,  Concini  and,  257 

Conde,  Louis  I.  de  Bourbon,  Prince  of, 
assassination  of,  1569,  224  ;  attempt  of, 
to  capture  the  royal  family,  222  ;  con- 
spiracy of  Amboise  and,  219 ;  defeat 
and  capture  of,  1562,  220 

Conde.  Louis  II.  de  Bourbon,  Prince  of, 
the  Great,  brilliant  campaign  of,  against 
the  Spaniards,  1643,  281  ;  capture  of 
Dunkirk  by,  1646,  282  ;  imprisonment 
of,  1650,  315  ;  insurrection  under,  1651, 
316  ;  restoration  of,  to  favor,  318 ;  re- 
tirement of,  to  Flanders,  1652,  317  ; 
Turenne^and,  217 

Condillac,  Etienne  B.  de,  481 

Condorcet,  Marie  J.  A.  N.  Caritat,  Mar- 
quis of,  481 

Congress,  colonial,  1765,  449 

Constable,  in  France,  derivation  of  the 
word,  and  nature  of  the  office,  21 

Constantinople,  capture  of,  by  the  Otto- 
mans, 59,  67 

Contades,  Louis  G.  E.,  Marquis  of, 
Marshal  of  France,  campaigns  of,  in 
the  Seven  Years'  War,  427 

Cook,  Captain  James,  voyages  of,  477 

Copenhagen,  diet  of,  1530,  173  ;  treaty 
of.  1660,  326 


Copernicus  and  his  astronomical  system, 

158 

Corneille,  Pierre,  works  of,  370 
Cornwallis,  Charles,  Marquis  of,  surrender 

of,  at  Yorktown,  1781,  454 
Corbie,    capture    of,  by    the   Spaniards, 

1636,  279 

Correggio,  works  of,  152    . 
Corsica,   conquest   of,   by   France,   1768, 

509;   occupation  of,   by    Henry  II.  of 

France,   1554,    112  ;    restoration   of,    to 

the  Genoese,  under  the  treaty  of  1559, 

"5 
Cortes,  Ferdinand,  conquest  of  Mexico  by, 

1519,  126  ;  cruelties  of,  in  Mexico,  127  ; 

disgrace  and  death  of,  127 
Corvmus,  Mathias,  capture  of  Vienna  by, 

1485,  53 

Cosmo  de  Medici.    See  MEDICI 
Cossacks,  revolt  of,  at  Azof,  1705,  389 
Coster,  Lawrence,  and  movable  type,  138 
Cotte,  Robert  de,  architectural  work  of, 

482 

Coucy,  edict  of,  revocation  of,  178 
Coulomb,  Charles  A.  de,  scientific  work 

of,  474 
Council  of  the  Indies,  Spanish,  creation 

of,  by  Ferdinand,  1511,  130 
Courts  of    justice,   French,    during    the 

eighteenth  century,  488 
Cousin,  Jean,  French  artist,  155 
Coustou,  Guillaume,  482 ;    and   Nicolas, 

works  of,  376 

Coutras,  battle  of,  1587,  230 
Covenanters.  Scotch,  origin  of,  1638,  295 
Coysevox,  Antoine,  works  of,  376 
Crespy,  treaty  of,  1544,  108 
Crimea,  seizure    of,   by    Catherine    II., 

1783,  465 

Cromwell,  Oliver,  administration  of,  309  ; 
assumes  the  title  of  Protector,  1653, 
306  ;  barbarities  under,  in  Ireland, 

1649,  303,  307  ;  beginning  of  career  of, 
299  ;   death    of,   1658,   309 ;    defeat    of 
Prince  Rupert  by,  1644,  300  ;  intended 
emigration    of,   295  ;     Parliament    ex- 
pelled by,  1653,  306  ;   progress  of  Eng- 
land under,  308  ;  victory  of,  at  Dunbar, 

1650,  305  ;    Worcester    captured     by, 

1651,  305 

Cromwell,  Richard,  brief  protectorship 
of,  309 

Cronstadt.     See  KRONSTADT 

Cuba,  discovery  of,  by  Columbus,  1492, 
125 

Cudworth,  Ralph,  380 

Culloden,  defeat  of  Charles  Stuart  at, 
1746,  419,  437 

Cuzco,  strife  among  the  Portuguese  cap- 
tors of,  128 

D'AGUESSEAU,  HENRI  F.,  481 

D'Aiguillon,  Duke,  510 

D'Alembert,   Jean   le     Rond,  works   of, 

Dampier,  William,  477 

D'Argenson,  Antoine  J.  Dezallier,  on 
the  government  of  France  in  the  eigh- 
teenth century,  499 


526 


INDEX. 


Darnley,  Henry,  Mary,  Queen  of  Scots, 
and,  214 

Daubenton,  Louis  J.  M.,  476 

Daun,  Leopold  J.  M.,  Count  of,  cam- 
paigns of,  in  the  Seven  Years'  War,  425 

Davila,  Henrico  C.,  380 

Declaration  of  Independence,  signing  of, 
1776,  450 

Declaration  of  Rights,  signing  of,  by 
William  III.,  1689 

Delisle,  Guillaume,  384 

Delorme,  Philibert,  French  architect,  155 

Denmark,  alliance  of,  with  Francis  I.  of 
France,  1541,  107  ;  at  the  opening  of  the 
Thirty  Years'  War,  268  ;  conquest  of,  by 
Charles  XII.  of  Sweden,  390  ;  invasion 
of,  by  Charles  Gustavus,  1658,  326  ; 
overthrow  of  the  aristocracy  in,  1660, 
326 ;  Reformation  of  the  sixteenth 
century  in,  173  ;  States  General  of, 
suppression  of,  by  the  aristocracy, 
1540,  173  ;  treaty  of,  with  Francis  I.  of 
France,  1541,  103 

Descartes,  Rene,  influence  of,  on  science, 
383  ;  philosophical  system  of,  372 

Despreaux,  Nicolas  Boileau.  See  Boi- 
LEAU 

Dessau,  confederacy  of  Catholic  princes 
formed  at,  1525,  167 

Dettingen,  battle  of,  1743,  417 

Diaz,  Bartholomew,  discovery  of  the 
Cape  of  Good  Hope  by,  1486,  120 

Diderot,  Denis,  works  of,  481 

Dieppe,  early  explorers  from,  1364-1410, 
119 

Discoveries,  maritime,  first,  118;  prog- 
ress of,  under  Queen  Elizabeth,  243 

Diu,  conquest  of,  by  Nuno  d'Acunha, 
1531,  122 ;  defense  of,  by  John  de 
Castro,  122;  Portuguese  victory  at, 
1508,  121 

Djem,  Ottoman  prince.     See  ZIZIM 

Dolgorouki,  princes,  banishment  and 
slaughter  of,  457 

Donatello,  founder  of  the  Florentine 
school  of  sculptors,  148 

Doria,  Andrew,  alliance  of,  with  Charles 
V.,  08 ;  expeditions  under,  against 
Ottoman  pirates,  103 

Dormans,  battle  of,  229 

Dragout,  Ottoman  pirate,  conquest  of 
Tripoli  by,  1551,  104 

Drake,  Sir  Francis,  American  expedition 
of,  1577-80,  216 

Dreux,  battle  of,  1562,  221 

Drogheda,  massacre  at,  under  Cromwell, 
1649,303 

Dryden,  John,  379 

Dubois,  Guillaume,  appointed  Arch- 
bishop of  Cambrai,  401 

Dubourg,  Anne,  execution  of,  179 

Duguay-Trouin,  Rene,  naval  exploits  of, 
362  * 

Dunbar,  battle  of,  1650,  305 

Dunkirk,  capture  of,  by  the  Prince  of 
Conde,  1646,  282  ;  by  Turenne,  1658,  318 

Dupleix,  Joseph,  administration  of,  in 
India,  420,  442 

Duquesne,   Abraham,    bombardment    of 


Genoa  by,  1685,    345 ;    Mediterranean 
pirates  suppressed  by,  344 

EAST  INDIA  COMPANY,  Dutch,  146  ;  Eng- 
lish, origin  and  history  of,  440 

Edgehijl,  battle  of,  1642,  298 

Education  in  the  North  American  colo- 
nies, 448 

Edward  IV.,  King  of  England,  alliance 
of,  with  the  Duke  of  Burgundy,  14  ; 
futile  invasion  of  France  by,  19  ;  pro- 
claimed king,  31 

Edward  VI.,  King  of  England,  renuncia- 
tion of  Catholicism  by,  182 

Egypt  and  Syria,  conquest  of,  by  the 
Ottomans,  1516,  72 

Elizabeth,  Queen  of  England,  accession 
of,  1558,  183,  211 ;  aid  furnished  to 
French  Protestants  by,  220 ;  charac- 
teristics of,  211 ;  condition  of  England 
under,  242 ;  death  of,  1603,  244 ;  ex- 
communication of,  by  Pope  Pius  V., 
1570,  215  ;  Mary  Stuart  and,  215  ; 
Philip  II.  of  Spain  proposes  marriage 
to,  212 

Elizabeth  Petrowna,  Czarina  of  Russia, 
reign  of,  459 

Emanuel  the  Fortunate,  King  of  Portugal, 

5° 
Emigration    from    England    to   America 

under  Charles  I.,  294 
Enghien,  Duke  of.     See  CONDE,  Louis 

II.  DE  BOL'RBON,  PRINCE  OF 

England,  attempted  invasion  of,  by  Louis 
XIV.,  1692,  355  ;  civil  war  in,  under 
Charles  I.,  298 ;  coalition  against,  in 
1780,  453  ;  colonization  methods  of,  136; 
commonwealth  of,  declared,  1649,  303; 
condition  of,  at  the  middle  of  the 
fifteenth  century,  27 ;  condition  of, 
in  1661,  320  ;  condition  of,  under  Henry 
VIII.,  181  ;  condition  of,  under  the 
Stuarts  and  Cromwell,  286  ;  emigration 
from,  to  America,  under  Charles  I., 
294  ;  France  and,  alliance  of,  under 
George  I.,  402  ;  India  and,  443 ; 
Netherlands  and,  treaty  between,  1585, 
216 ;  Portugal  and,  treaty  between, 
1703,  435  ;  prosperity  of,  after  the 
religious  wars  of  the  sixteenth  century, 
241  ;  Reformation  of  the  sixteenth 
century  in,  180 ;  restoration  of  the 
monarchy  in,  1660,  309  ;  revolution  of 
1688,  349  ;  results  of  revolution,  434  ; 
Scotland  and,  union  of,  1707,435  ;  Spain 
and,  religious  war  between,  in  the  six- 
teenth century,  212,  215 ;  territorial 
additions  to.  under  the  treaty  of  Paris, 
1763,  431  ;  war  of  the  Austrian  suc- 
cession and,  416,  437  ;  war  of  the 
Spanish  succession  and,  360 

English  literature,  Elizabethan  era  of, 
244;  in  the  seventeenth  century,  379 

Engraving  on  copper,  first,  156 

Epee,  Charles  M.  de  1',  and  deaf  mutes, 
476 

Erasmus.  "  Cplloquia,"  great  demand 
for,  after  the  invention  of  printing,  139  ; 
literary  career  of,  145 


INDEX. 


527 


Ercilla  y  Zuniga,  Alonzo,  works  of,  370 

Eric  XIV.,  King  of  Sweden,  Philip  II. 
and,  239 

Escurial,  palace  of,  201 

Essek,  defeat  of  the  Austrians  at,  by 
Souleiman  I.,  1537,  105 

Essex,  Robert  Devereux,  Earl  of,  mili- 
tary operations  of,  as  leader  of  the 
parliamentary  army,  298  ;  rebellion  and 
execution  of,  1601,  244 

Estaing,  Charles  H.,  Count  d',  in  the 
American  revolution,  452 

Etables,  treaty  of,  77 

Etching,  invention  of,  156 

Eugene,  Fran5ois  of  Savoy,  Prince,  mili- 
tary operations  of,  against  the  Mila- 
nais,  1701-02,  359  ;  retreat  of,  from 
France,  1712,  361  ;  victories  of,  over 
the  Ottomans,  1716-17,  413 

Eugenius  IV.,  Pope,  re-establishment  of 
the  University  of  Rome  by,  140 

Euler,  Leonard,  mathematical  work  of, 
4?i.  472 

Europe,  condition  of,  at  the  middle  of 
the  fifteenth  century,  i  ;  in  1661,  320  ; 
in  the  sixteenth  century,  effects  of  the 
influx  of  American  gold  and  silver,  135  ; 
low  standard  of  morals  in,  143  ;  in  the 
eighteenth  century,  484 

Evangelical  Union  of  Germany,  forma- 
tion of,  269 


FAIRFAX,  THOMAS,  LORD,  leader  of  the 
parliamentary  forces,  300 

"  Famine  compact ''  in  France,  497,  501 

Farnese.  Alexander,  Duke  of  Parma, 
campaigns  of,  in  the  Netherlands,  210  ; 
death  of,  1591,  232  ;  invasion  of  France 
by,  1590,  231 

Farnese,  Pietro  L.,  assassination  of,  no 

Faust,  or  Fust,  Johann,  invention  of 
printing  by,  138 

Felton,  John,  assassination  of  the  Duke 
of  Buckingham  by,  1628,  293 

Fenelon,  Francois  de  Salignac  de  la 
Mothe,  works  of,  368 

Ferdinand  I.,  Emperor  of  the  West,  acces- 
sion of,  1556,  112 

Ferdinand  II.,  Emperor  of  the  West, 
restoration  of  secularized  property  by, 
275  ;  Thirty  Years'  War  and,  271  ; 
victory  of,  at  White  Mountain,  1620, 
2  7  3_ 

Ferdinand  III.,  Emperor  of  the  West, 
Turenne  and,  283 

Ferdinand  the  Catholic,  King  of  Spain, 
accession  of,  43  ;  and  Isabella,  Colum- 
bus and,  124  ;  colonial  government 
under,  130 ;  perfidy  of,  143  ;  revival  of 
the  Inquisition  by,  44 ;  second  mar- 
riage of,  83 

Ferdinand  VI.,  King  of  Spain,  reforms 
attempted  under,  503 

Ferdinand  I.,  King  of  Naples,  reign  of, 
66  :  treachery  of,  143 

Ferdinand  II.,  King  of  Naples,  flight  of, 

I4Q5>  79 

Ferdinand  III.,  King  of  Denmark,  over- 
throw of  the  aristocracy  by,  326 


Ferdinand  of  Austria,  King  of  Hungary, 
101 

Fermat,  Pierre,  discoveries  of,  384 

Ferrari,  of  Bologna,  Italian  mathemati- 
cian, 158 

Fieschi,  Giovanni  L.,  conspiracy  of,  no 

Filicaja,  Vincenzo  da,  works  of,  379 

Finiguerra,  first  engraver  on  copper,  156 

Finisterre,  Cape,  battle  of,  1747,  420 

Fleix,  peace  of,  1580,  229 

Fleury,  Andre  H.  de,  Bishop  of  Frejus, 
influence  of,  over  Louis  XV.,  406  ; 
military  operations  of,  1733-35,  4°7>  498  ; 
ministry  of,  407 ;  war  of  the  Austrian 
succession  and,  417 

Florence,  _  entry  of  Charles  VIII.  of 
France  into,  1494,  78  ;  in  the  fifteenth 
century,  61 

Fontaine.     See  LA  FONTAINE 

Fontana,  Felix,  scientific  work  of,  474 

Fontenoy,  battle  of,  1745,  418 

Fornovo,  battle  of,  1495,  80 

Fourcroy,  Antoine  F.  de,  chemical  work 
oil  475 

France,  absolute  monarchy  in,  under 
Louis  XIV.,  329  ;  agriculture  in,  during 
the  eighteenth  century,  495  ;  American 
revolution  and,  451  ;  and  England, 
negotiations  for  peace  between,  1711, 
361  ;  architecture  in,  in  the  sixteenth 
century,  155  ;  army  of,  during  the 
eighteen ;h  century,  490  ;  army  of, 
reforms  in,  unuer  Louvois,  338  ;  army 
of,  sufferings  of,  in  1709,  360  \  army  of, 
under  Henry  IV.,  250  ;  art  in,  in  the 
sixteenth  century,  154  ;  Austria  and, 
in  1740,  415  ;  Austria  and,  opening  of 
the  conflict  between,  1519,  91  ;  Calvin- 
ism in,  development  of,  176  ;  civil  war 
in  (the  Fronde),  314  ;  clergy  of,  during 
the  eighteenth  century,  491  ;  coalition 
against,  1672,  342;  College  of,  Erasmus 
declines  the  direction  of,  145  ;  College 
of,  founding  of,  by  Francis  I.,  1530, 
144  ;  colonization  methods  of,  136;  com- 
merce of,  development  of,  in  the  first 
half  of  the  eighteenth  century,  422  ; 
commerce  of,  at  the  middle  of  the 
fifteenth  century,  8 ;  commerce  of, 
after  the  edict  of  Nantes,  246 ;  com- 
merce of,  in  1661,  320  ;  commerce  of,  at 
the  close  of  the  war  of  the  Spanish  suc- 
cession, 364  ;  England  and,  alliance  of, 
under  George  I.,  402  ;  famine  in,  1709, 
360  ;  finances  of,  during  the  eighteenth 
century,  488  ;  finances  of,  John  Law 
and,  403  ;  under  Colbert,  331  ;  finance 
of,  under  the  Paris-Duverneys,  406  ; 
government  of,  during  the  eighteenth 
century,  485  ;  Holland  and,  alliance  of, 
1627,  261  ;  Holland  and.  commercial 
rivalry  of,  under  Louis  XIV.,  340 ; 
India  and,  in  the  eighteenth  century, 
420,  441  ;  invasion  of,  by  the  allied 
forces,  1513,  87  ;  invasion  of,  by 
Charles  V.,  1544,  108  ;  law  of,  revision 
of,  under  Louis  XIV.,  336;  manufac- 
tures in,  during  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, 494  ;  navy  of,  in  the  Seven  Years' 


5*8 


INDEX. 


War,  429 ;  navy  of,  revival  of,  under 
Colbert,  335  ;  navy  of,  weakness  of,  in 
the  war  of  the  Spanish  succession,  361  ; 
obligation  of  the  United  States  to,  450  ; 
Ottoman  empire  and,  alliance  of,  101  ; 
Ottoman  empire  and,  alliance  of,  re- 
nounced by  Louis  XIV.,  339  ;  political 
and  military  decline  of,  in  the  eighteenth 
century,  509  ;  protective  tariff  in,  under 
Louis  XIV.,  332;  Reformation  of  the 
sixteenth  century  in,  176 ;  religious 
wars  in,  in  the  sixteenth  century,  218  ; 
results  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War  to, 
284 ;  social  condition  of,  during  the 
eighteenth  century,  491  ;  Spain  and, 
wars  between,  317,  402  ;  States  General 
of,  convocation  of,  1614,  256 ;  taxation 
in,  during  the  eighteenth  century,  480, 
492  ;  territorial  increase  of,  under  Col- 
bert, 335 ;  treaty  of  Paris  and,  1763, 
432  ;  treaty  of  Vienna  and,  1738,  408  ; 
under  Cardinal  Richelieu,  263 

Francis  I.,  King  of  France,  alliance  of, 
with  the  Ottoman  empire,  102  ;  alliance 
of,  with  the  Scots,  100,  103 ;  alliance 
of,  with  Sweden  and  Denmark,  1541, 
107;  and  Charles  V.,9i  ;  and  Charles 
V.,  interview  of,  1538,106  ;  and  Henry 
VIII.  of  England,  100;  as  patron  of 
art  and  letters,  143,  155  ;  assassination 
of  envoys  of,  by  the  governor  of  the 
Milanais,  1540,  107  ;  capture  of,  by  the 
Spaniards,  1525,  95  ;  death  of,  108 ; 
Italian  expedition  of,  1515,  88  ;  Milan 
submits  to,  1515,  89;  1524,  95;  recap- 
ture of  Piedmont  by,  105  ;  Reforma- 
tion of  the  sixteenth  century  and,  177; 
seizure  of  Savoy  by,  1535,  104  ;  treaty 
of,  with  Denmark,  1541,  103 

Francis  II.,  King  of  France,  brief  reign 
of,  203 ;  marriage  of,  to  Mary  Stuart, 
204 

Francis  Xavier,  St.,  and  John  de  Castro, 
123  ;  death  of,  1552,  133  ;  missionary 
labors  of,  in  India  and  Japan,  133 

Franklin.    Benjamin,   scientific  work   of, 

Frederick  III.,  Emperor  of  the  West, 
reign  of,  51 

Frederick  I.,  first  King  of  Prussia  (Fred- 
erick III.,  Elector  of  Brandenburg), 
accession  of,  1688,  410;  ambitious 
schemes  of,  411;  crowns  himself  King 
of  Prussia,  1701.  411  ;  death  of,  411 

Frederick  II.,  the  Great,  King  of  Prussia, 
accession  of,  1740,  413  ;  campaigns  of, 
in  the  Seven  Years'  War,  424  ;  conquest 
of  Silesia  by,  1740,  415  ;  dreary  youth 
of,  412 ;  Earl  of  Chatham  and,  426 ; 
first  campaign  of,  413;  growth  of 
Prussia  under,  423  ;  Poland  and,  462 

Frederick  William  I.  of  Prussia,  alliance 
of,  with  Russia  and  Austria,  1733,  412; 
character  of,  411  ;  conquest  of  Swedish 
territory  by,  412 

Frederick  the  Wise,  Elector  of  Saxony, 
declination  of  the  crown  of  Germany 
by,  91  ;  protector  of  Luther,  164 

Frederick  V.,  Elector  Palatine  and  King 


of  Bohemia,  flight  of,  273  ;  supineness 
of,  272 

Frederick  of  Hohenzollern,  Burggrave  of 
Nuremberg,  origin  of  Prussia  under, 
1417,  409 

Frederick  William,  the  Great  Elector  of 
Brandenburg,  conquests  of,  410 

Frederick  I.,  King  of  Denmark  and  Nor- 
way, accession  of,  1524,  171  ;  Protes- 
tantism embraced  by,  1525,  173 

Frederick,  King  of  Naples,  betrayal  of, 
by  Gonsalvo  of  Cordova,  82 

Frederick  of  Hesse-Cassel,  Prince-consort 
of  Sweden,  accession  of,  1720,  395 

Freiburg,  battle  of,  1644,  282  ;  treaty  of, 
iS'Si  89 

French  and  Indian  war  in  America,  1754, 
423 

French  language,  characteristics  of,  in 
the  sixteenth  century,  143 

French   literature   in   the  sixteenth   cen- 
tury, 144  ;  in  the  seventeenth  century, 
365  ;  in  the  eighteenth  century,  478 
'    French  Revolution,  causes  of,  484  ;  open- 
ing of,  514 

Fronde,  war  of  the,  in  France,  314 
1     Frondsberg.  George,  97 
'.    Fuessen,  treaty  of,  1745,  418 

GABRIEL,  ANGE,  architectural  work  of, 
482 

Galiga'i,  Leonora,  wife  of  Concini,  execu- 
tion of,  1617,  258 

Galilei,  Galileo,  discoveries  of,  383 

Gama,  Vasco  da,  voyage  of,  to  India, 
1497-98,  1 20 

Gassendi,  Pierre,  Descartes  and,  372 

Gebhard  of  Truchsess,  Archbishop  of 
Cologne,  Catholicism  renounced  by, 
1582,  269 

Geneva,  separation  of,  from  the  Catholic 
Church,  174  ;  under  Calvin,  1540-64, 175 

Genoa  and  the  renaissance  of  letters, 
140  ;  bombardment  of,  by  Duquesne, 
1685,  345 ;  Columbus  and  the  senate 
of,  124  ;  in  the  second  half  of  the  fif- 
teenth century,  59 

Geography,  reformation  of,  in  the  sev- 
enteenth century,  384 

Geographical  discoveries  of  the  eigh- 
teenth century,  477 

George  I.,  King  of  Great  Britain,  acces- 
sion of,  1714,  435  ;  alliance  of,  with  the 
Regent  of  France,  402 

George  II.,  King  of  Great  Britain,  acces- 
sion of,  1727,  436 

George  III.,  King  of  Great  Britain,  ac- 
cession of,  1760,  439 

i  Germaine  de  Foix,  Queen  of  Ferdinand, 
King  of  Spain,  cession  of  Naples  to, 
1505-  83 

German  literature  in  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury, 145  ;  in  the  seventeenth  century, 

379 

Germantown,  battle  of,  1777,  451 
Germany,  art  in,  during  the  Renaissance, 
156  ;    Catholic    restoration    in,    in    the 
sixteenth  century,  269  ;  classical  schol- 
ars of,  in  the  sixteenth  century,   146  ; 


INDEX. 


529 


condition  of,  at  the  middle  of  the  fif- 
teenth century,  51  ;  condition  of,  in 
1661,  324  ;  invasion  of,  by  Henry  II.  of 
France,  1551-52,  in  ;  invasion  of,  by 
Christian  IV.,  1625,  273  ;  invasion  of, 
by  Gustavus  Adolphus,  1630,  276 ; 
invasion  of,  by  Louis  XIV.,  1688,  356  ; 
results  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War  to,  284 

Ghent,  submission  of,  to  France,  1538,  106 

Ghiberti,  Lorenzo,  Italian  sculptor,  148 

Ghirlandajo,  Domenico  del,  master  of 
Michael  Angelo,  149 

Gibraltar,  capture  of,  by  the  English, 
1707,  360 ;  siege  of,  by  the  Count 
d'Artois,  1782,  455 

Giotto  and  his  school  of  painting,  148 

Girardon,  Francois,  works  of,  376 

Goa,  capture  of,  by  Albuquerque,  1510, 
121 

Goertz,  George  H.,  Baron  von,  intrigues 
and  execution  of,  394,  395 

Gold  and  silver,  American,  effects  of  in- 
flux of,  in  Europe,  sixteenth  century, 
!35 

Gondi,  Paul  of.  See  RKTZ,  J.  F.  P.  DE 
GONDI,  CARDINAL  DK 

Gonsalvo  of  Cordova,  betrayal  of  Freder- 
ick, King  of  Naples,  by,  82 

Goujon,  Jean,  French  sculptor,  155 

Gourville,  Jean  Herault  de,  historical 
work  of,  369 

Granada,  siege  of,  1491,  44 

Granvelle,  Cardinal,  administration  of, 
in  the  Netherlands,  207 

Grasse,  Francois  J.,  Count  de,  capture  of, 
in  Jamaica,  1782,  454  ;  victories  of,  in 
the  Antilles,  454 

Greek  Church  in  Russia,  reformations  in, 
under  Peter  the  Great,  397 

Greek  colonies,  nature  and  development 
of,  135 

Greek  empire,  conquest  of,  by  Mohammed 
II.,  69 

Greenwich  Hospital,  founding  of,  by 
William  III.,  1696,  434 

Gregory  XIII.,  Pope,  Gregorian  calendar 
established  by,  197 

Gregory,  James,  385 

Grenada,  island  of,  capture  of,  by  d'Es- 
taing,  1779,  452 

Greuze,  Jean  B.,  works  of,  483 

Grey,  Lady  Jane,  execution  of,  1553,  182 

Grijalva,  Hernando  de,  discovery  of 
Mexico  by,  1518,  126 

Grotius,  or  Van  Groot,  Hugo,  380 

Guanahani,  island  of,  landing  of  Colum- 
bus on,  1492,  124 

Guatemozin,  Emperor  of  Mexico,  torture 
of,  by  Cortes,  1521,  126 

Guebriant,  Jean  B.  Budes,  Count  of,  mili- 
tary successes  of,  281 

Guidi,  Domenicho,  works  of,  379 

Guinea,  discovery  of,  1364,  119 

Guise,  house  of,  Catherine  de  Medici 
and,  203 

Guise,  Francis,  Duke  of,  capture  of 
Calais  by,  1558,  114  ;  invasion  of  Italy 
by,  1556,  113 

Guise,  Henry  of  Lorraine,  Duke  of,  alli- 


ance of,  with  Philip  II.,  1584,  230 ; 
assassination  of,  221  ;  defeat  of  Conde 
by,  1562,  220 ;  League  and,  229  ;  mas- 
sacre  of  St.  Bartholomew's  Day  and,  227 

Gunpowder  Plot,  discovery  of,  1605,  287 

Guns,  siege  of,  by  Souleiman  I.,  1532,  102 

Gustavus  I.,  King  of  Sweden  (Gustavus 
Vasa),  accession  of,  1523,  171 :  corona- 
tion of,  1528,  173  ;  development  of  the 
country  under,  173  ;  Protestantism  in- 
troduced by,  172 

Gustavus  Adolphus,  King  of  Sweden, 
death  of,  1632,  277  ;  invasion  of  Ger- 
many by,  1630,  276  ;  military  operations 
of,  in  Livonia  and  Prussia,  1625,  276; 
Richelieu  and,  276 

Gustavus  III.,  King  of  Sweden,  cam- 
paigns of,  469  ;  reforms  under,  508 

Gutenberg,  John,  invention  of  printing 
by,  138 

Guyenne,  Charles,  Duke  of,  brother  of 
Louis  XL,  16 

HABEAS    CORPUS,  veto  of,  in    England, 

l679,  35  * 

Hague,  The,  league  of,  1701-03,  358 ; 
Philip  II.  and,  truce  between,  1609, 
211  ;  States  General  of,  separation  of, 
from  the  Netherlands,  1581,  210  ;  triple 
alliance  of,  1668,  340 

Haidar  Ali,  struggles  of,  against  the 
English,  444 

Halley,  Edmund,  385 

Hampden,  John,  trial   of,  lessons  of,  295 

Harvey,  William,  385 

Hassan,  Ouzoun,  Tartar  chief,  defeat  of, 
by  Mohammed  II.,  70 

Hastings,  Warren,  trial  of,  445 

Haiiy,  Rene  J.,  Abbe,  476 

Haiiy,  Valentin,  476 

Hayti,  discovery  of,  by  Columbus,  1492, 
125 

Helvetius,  Claude  A.,  481 

Henries,  three,  war  of  the,  1586-89,  230 

Henry  II.,  King  of  France,  accession  of, 
1547,  108  ;  and  Pope  Paul  IV.,  113  ; 
efforts  of,  to  suppress  Protestantism, 
in  ;  foreign  policy  of,  in  ;  invasion  of 
Germany  by,  1551-52,  in;  Reformation 
and,  178  ;  secret  alliance  of,  with  Ger- 
man Protestant  princes,  in 

Henry  III.,  Kingof  France,  accession  of, 
1574,  228  ;  defeat  and  assassination  of, 
1589,  231 

Henry  IV.,  King  of  France  and  Navarre, 
the  Great,  accession  of,  1589,  231  ; 
assassination  of,  1610,  252  ;  canal  with 
locks  constructed  by,  137  ;  condition  of 
France  under,  747  ;  death  of,  1610,  255  ; 
designs  of,  against  Austria,  251  ;  favor- 
ites of,  250  ;  marriage  of,  to  Princess 
Marguerite,  226  ;  patronage  of  the  arts 
by,  252  ;  Protestantism  renounced  by, 
233 

Henry  VI.,  King  of  England,  29 

Henry  VII.,  King  of  England,  character 
of,  36  ;  Columbus  and,  124  ;  founder  of 
the  Tudor  dynasty,  33  ;  suppression  of 
public  liberties  by,  35 


53° 


INDEX. 


Henry  VIII.,  King  of  England,  alliance 
of  with  Charles  V.  of  Germany,  93, 
107 ;  and  the  Holy  League,  97 ;  and 
Louis  XII.  of  France,  88;  divorce  of, 
from  Catherine  of  Aragon,  180  ;  excom- 
munication of,  by  Pope  Clement  VII., 
180 ;  marriage  of,  to  Anne  Boleyn, 
1532,  180 ;  persecutions  under,  181  ; 
siege  of  Boulogne  by,  1544,  108  ;  wives 
of,  181 

Henry  IV. ,  King  of  Castile,  42 

Henry,  son  of  King  John  I.  of  Portugal, 
African  explorations  of,  119 

Herrera  Tordesillas,  Antonio  de,  380 

Herschel,  William,  astronomical  work  of, 
473 

Hexham,  battle  of,  1463,  31 

Hispaniola,  island  of,  depopulation  of,  by 
slavery,  131 

Historical  works  of  the  seventeenth 
century,  380 

Hobbes,  Thomas.     "  Leviathan,"  380 

Hochstedt,  battles  of.     See  BLENHEIM 

Hohenzollern,  house  of,  growth  of  Prussia 
under,  1417-1640,  409 

Holbach,  Paul  Thyry,  Baron  of,  481 

Holland,  condition  of,  in  1661,  321  ;  France 
and,  alliance  of,  1627,  261  ;  France  and, 
commercial  rivalry  of.  undo-  Louis 
XIV.,  340  ;  invasions  of,  by  the  French, 
1672,341  ;  1747,420;  Navigation  Act  of 
1651  and,  305  ;  prosperity  of,  after  the 
religious  wars  of  the  sixteenth  century, 
245.  See  also  HAGUE 

Holy  League,  formation  of,  1511,  86 

Hopital,  Michael  de  1',  religious  policy 
of,  219 

Hospitals  in  France,  condition  of,  during 
the  eighteenth  century,  498 

Hubertsburg,  treaty  of,  432 

Hudson's  Bay,  discovery  of,  by  Sebastian 
Cabot,  128 

Huguenots  in  France,  Richelieu  and, 
260 ;  Mamelukes  and,  conflict  between, 
at  Geneva,  1530,  174 

Hungary,  and  Bohemia,  struggles  of, 
against  Austria,  in  the  fifteenth  cen- 
tury, 51  ;  conquest  of,  by  Soulei'man 
I.,  1529,  101  :  division  of,  by  the  treaty 
of  Wuitzen,  1536,  106  ;  recapture  of,  by 
Soulei'man  I.,  1541,  106  ;  struggle  for, 
between  Charles  V.  and  Soule'iman  I., 
1529,  ^167 

Huniadi,  John,  raises  the  siege  of  Bel- 
grade, 52,  69 

Hutten,  Ulrich  von,  145,  147 

Huyghens,  Christian,  384 

Hyder  Ali.     See  HAIDAR  ALI 

IGNATIUS  DK  LOYOLA,  founder  of  the 
Jesuits,  192 

Index,  Congregation  of  the,  establishment 
of,  191 

India,  conquest  of,  by  England,  443  ; 
France  and,  in  the  eighteenth  century, 
420,  441  ;  John  Law  and,  441  ;  mis- 
sionary labors  of  St.  Francis  Xavier  in, 
J33  ;  Portuguese  colonization  in,  1500, 
121  ;  route  to,  Columbus  and,  123 


Indulgences,  traffic  in,  163 

Innocent  XL,  Pope,  Louis  XIV.  and, 
conflict  between,  1687,  345 

Inquisition,  establishment  of,  in  Spanish 
colonies,  134 ;  in  Spain  under  Ferdi- 
nand, 44  ;  revival  of,  1542,  191 

Inquisitors,  state,  of  Venice,  despotic  rule 
of,  60 

Insurance  companies,  first,  137 

Ireland,  barbarities  under  Cromwell  in, 
1649,  3°3.  3°7 

Isabella  of  Castile,  Queen  of  Spain,  43  ; 
death  of,  125.  See  also  FERDINAND  AND 
ISABELLA. 

Italian  literature  of  the  Renaissance, 
licentiousness  of,  142 ;  of  the  seven- 
teenth century,  379 

Italy,  architecture  in,  in  the  sixteenth 
century,  147  ;  art  in,  causes  of  rapid 
decline  in,  154 ;  condition  of,  in  the 
second  half  of  the  fifteenth  century,  56  ; 
condition  of,  under  the  treaty  of  1559, 
115  ;  condition  of,  in  1661,  323  ;  defeat 
of  the  Spaniards  in,  by  the  French, 
1642,  280  ;  French  conquests  in,  1744, 
419  ;  invasion  of,  by  Charles  VIII.  of 
France,  1494,  76 ;  invasion  of,  by 
Maximilian,  1495,  80 ;  invasion  of,  by 
Louis  XII.  of  France,  1500,  81  ;  inva- 
sion of,  by  Francis  I.  of  France,  1515, 
88  ;  invasion  of,  by  the  Duke  of  Guise, 
1556,  113  ;  printing  in,  rapid  growth 
of,  139  ;  struggle  for,  between  France 
and  Austria,  94 

Ivan  VI.  of  Russia,  murder  of,  459 

JAMAICA,  attack  upon,  by  the  French,  in 
1782,  454 

James  I.,  King  of  England  (James  VI. 
of  Scotland),  character  of,  286  ;  death 
of,  1625,  290 ;  Duke  of  Buckingham 
and,  289  ;  Parliament  and,  conflict  be- 
tween, 288  ;  recognition  of,  1603,  286  ; 
writings  of,  290 

James  II.,  King  of  England,  accession  of, 
1685,  351  ;  Catholicism  and,  352  ;  flight 
of,  1688,  353 ;  invasion  of  Ireland  by, 
1690,  ^55 

James  V.,  King  of  Scotland,  invasion  of 
England  by,  1542,  107 

Janissaries,  revolt  of,  under  Mourad  II., 
68 

Jansenism,  leaders  of,  373 

Japan,  missionary  labors  of  St.  Francis 
Xavier  in,  133 

Jassy,  treaty  of,  1791,  466 

Jeanne  d'Albret,  Queen  of  Navarre,  sus- 
picious death  of,  226 

Jeffreys,  George,  Lord,  infamy  of,  352 

Jenner,  Edward,  476 

Jesuits,  banishment  of,  from  Spain,  1767, 
503  ;  founding  of,  192  ;  missions  of, 
rapid  growth  of,  sixteenth  century,  135  ; 
organization  and  work  of,  193  ;  rapid 
progress  of,  194 

John  III.,  King  of  Sweden,  alliance  be- 
tween Philip  II.  and,  239 

John  II.,  King  of  Portugal,  Columbus' 
and,  124;  reign  of,  49 


INDEX. 


531 


John,  Don.     See  JUAN 
ohn  of  Aragon,  usurpation  of,  41 
ohn  of  Leyden.     See  BOCOLD,  JOHN 
ohn  Frederick,  Elector  of  Saxony,  cap- 
ture of,  at  Muhlburg,  1547,  169 
Joinville.  treaty  of,  1584,  230 
Joseph    I.,    King    of    Portugal,   reforms 

under,  502 
Joseph  II.,  Emperor  of  Austria,  reforms 

under,  506 
Jouffroy,   Marquis  de,  invention  of   the 

steamboat  by,  1783,  474 
Juan,  Don,  son  of  Charles  V.,  defeat  of 

the   Ottomans   by,    1571,   237  ;    in   the 

Netherlands,  209 
Julian,  Cardinal,  on  the  condition  of  the 

clergy  in  the  fifteenth  century,  162 
Julian  calendar  and  Gregorian  calendar, 

197 
Julius   II.,    Pope,   and    Louis    XII.    of 

France,  conflict  between,  86  ;  as  patron 

of  letters,  140 

KAINARDJI,  treaty  of,  1774,  465 
Kardis,  treaty  of,  1661,  326 
Kepler,  John,  discoveries  of,  383 
Knox,  John,  confession  of,  adopted  by 
the     Scotch     Parliament,     1560,     212  ; 
Reformation  in  Scotland  and,  180 
Koskiusko,  T.,  and  the  partition  of  Po- 
land, 467 
Kronstadt,  Russia,  harbor  of,  396 

LA  BOURDONNAIS,   BERTRAND  F.  MAH(S, 

COUNT  OF,  conquests  of,  in  India,  420, 

442 

La  Bruyere.     See  BRUYERE 
Lacaille,  Nicolas  L.  de,  Abbe,  astronom- 
ical work  of,  472 
Ladislaus   VI.,    King    of    Bohemia   and 

Hungary,  52 
La  Fayette,  Gilbert  du  Mottier,  Marquis 

de,  in  the  American  revolution,  451 
La  Fontaine,  Jean  de,  works  of,  372 
La    Grange,    Joseph    L.,    mathematical 

work  of.  471 

Lainez  and  the  Council  of  Trent,  195 
Lalande,    Joseph    J.     Le    Frangais    de, 

astronomical  work  of,  472 
Lally,  Thomas  A.,  Count,  administration 

of,  in  India,  430,  444  ;  execution  of,  444 
Lamettrie,  Julien  Offray  de,  481 
La  Mothe  le  Vayer,  Franqois  de,  works 

of,  373 
Lancaster  and  York,  houses  of,   War  of 

the  Roses  between,  28 
Lancelot,  Claude,  works  of,  373 
La  Perouse,  Jean  F.  Galaup  de,  voyages 

of.  477 

La  Place,  Pierre  S.,  Marquis  de,  mathe- 
matical work  of,  471,  472 

La  Quintinie,  Jean  de,  works  of,  376 

La  Rochefoucauld,  Francois,  Duke  of. 
"Maxims,"  367  ;  "Memoirs,"  370 

Las  Casas,  Bishop  of  Chiapa,  labors  of, 
in  behalf  of  Indians,  131 

Latin  language,  universal  use  of,  by  Ger- 
man scholars  of  the  sixteenth  century, 
'45 


La  Tremouille,  Louis  II.,  Sire  de,  capture 
of  Louis  XI.  by,  1486,  25 ;  1488,  26  ; 
repulse  of  the  English  by,  in  Picardy, 

1523.  94 

Laud,  William,  Archbishop  of  Canter- 
bury, persecutions  by,  295 

Laurentius  Petri,  Lutheran  preacher, 
honors  bestowed  upon,  by  Gustavus  I., 
172 

Lautrec  (Odet  de  Foix),  Marshal  of 
France,  death  of,  98  ;  defeat  of,  1522,  93 

Lavoisier,  Antoine  L.,  chemical  work  of, 

Law,  John,  financial  schemes  of,  403  ; 
French  power  in  India  and,  441 

League,  Catholic,  in  France,  in  the  six- 
teenth century,  229 

League  of  Public  Welfare  in  France, 
1465,  ii 

Le  Brun,  Charles,  works  of,  374 

Leczinska,  Mary,  marriage  of,  to  Louis 
Xy.,  1725,  406 

Leczinski,  Stanislaus,  and  the  throne  of 
Poland,  391,  407 

Lefort,  Gervaise,  Peter  the  Great  and,  388 

Leibnitz,  Gottfried  W.,  works  of,  381,  383 

Leighton,  Alexander,  barbarous  punish- 
ment of,  294 

Le  Maistre  de  Sacy,  Isaac,  translation  of 
the  Bible  by,  373 

Lenet,  Pierre,  historical  work  of,  369 

Le  Notre,  Andr6,  works  of,  376 

Lens,  battle  of,  1648,  283 

Leo  X.,  Pope,  accession  of,  87  ;  and  the 
concordat  of  1516.  89 ;  as  patron  of 
letters.  140  ;  declaration  of,  for  Charles 
V.  of  Germany,  93  ;  extravagant  expen- 
ditures of,  163  ;  .treachery  of,  143 

Leopardi,  Alexandro,  Italian  sculptor, 
148 

Leopold  I.,  Emperor  of  the  West,  and  the 
Spanish  succession,  357 

Lescot,  Pierre,  French  architect,  155 

Le  Sueur,  Eustache,  works  of,  374 

Lettres  de  cachet,  486 

Lexington,  battle  of,  1775,  449 

Liberty,  political,  appreciation  of,  by  the 
French,  330 

Liege,  sacking  of,  1468,  15 

Lima,  founding  of,  by  Pizarro,  1541,  128 

Linnaeus,  or  Linne,  Carl  von,  botanical 
work  of,  475 

Lisbon  as  a  commercial  center  in  the  six- 
teenth century,  123 ;  under  the  Mar- 
quis of  Pombal,  502 

Lissa,  battle  of,  1757,  426 

Literature,  Louis  XIV.  as  a  patron  of, 
337  ;  of  the  sixteenth  century  a  cause  of 
the  Reformation,  160 

Livonia,  capture  of,  by  Gustavus  Adol- 
phus,  1625,  276 

Lodi,  peace  of,  1454,  57 

Loire  and  Seine  rivers,  canal  between, 
constructed  by  Henry  IV.,  137 

Lomenie  de  Brienne,  Etienne  C.,  ministry 
of,  514 

London,  treaty  of,  1515,  88 

Longjumeau,  treaty  of,  1567,  223 

Lopez  de  Vega.     See  VEGA 


532 


INDEX. 


Lorraine,  Claude  Gelee,  called,  works  of, 
375. 

Lorraine,  France  and,  after  the  Thirty 
Years'  War,  284 

Louis  XI.  King  of  France,  and  Alphonso 
V.  of  Portugal,  49 ;  capture  of  Per- 
pignan  by,  1474,  21  ;  cession  and  re- 
taking of  Normandy  by,  13  ;  death  of, 
23  ;  defeat  and  capture  of,  by  La  Tre- 
mouille,  25,  26 ;  imprisonment  of,  in 
the  castle  of  Peronne,  15  ;  letter  posts 
established  by,  1464,  136  ;  ransom  of  the 
cities  of  the  Somme  by,  it  ;  reign  of, 
ip;  surrender  of  Cerdagne  and  Rous- 
sillon  to,  1462,  ii  ;  terrible  punishments 
inflicted  by,  20 

Louis  XII.,  King  of  France,  accession 
of,  81  ;  and  Henry  VIII.  of  England, 
88;  and  Pope  Julius  II.,  86;  conquest 
of  Milan  by,  1500,  82  ;  death  of,  88  ; 
Italian  expedition  of,  1500,  81  ;  marriage 
of,  to  Mary  of  England,  88  ;  plots  of, 
while  Duke  of  Orleans,  24,  77  ;  resist- 
ance of  Venice  to,  1509,  85  ;  surrender 
of  Naples  to,  1501,  82 

Louis  XIII.,  King  of  France,  Albert  de 
Luynes  and,  257  ;  death  of,  1643,  266  ; 
minority  of,  255 

Louis  XIV.,  the  Great,  King  of  France, 
absolute  monarchy  of,  329 ;  and  the 
Duke  of  Savoy,  357  ;  and  the  Spanish 
succession,  357  ;  attempted  invasion  of 
England  by,  1692,  355  ;  birth  of,  1638, 
262  ;  Charles  II.  of  England  and, 
alliance  between,  349  ;  closing  years  of 
reign  of,  363  :  coalition  against,  1672, 
342  ;  death  of,  1715,  363  ;  decline  of 
power  of,  359  ;  foreign  policy  of,  338  ; 
invasion  of  the  Netherlands  by, 
1667,  339 ;  invasion  of  Holland  by, 
1672,  341  ;  invasion  of  Germany  by, 
1688,  356  ;  League  of  Augsburg  against, 
1686,  346 ;  marriage  of,  to  Maria 
Theresa,  Infanta  of  Spain,  1660,  318  ; 
minority  of,  311  ;  palaces  erected  by, 
377i  378  ;  Pope  Innocent  XI.  and,  con- 
flict between,  1687,  345  ;  recognition  of 
William  III.  by,  1697,  357  ;  revocation 
of  the  edict  of  Nantes  by,  1685,  346  ; 
triumph  of,  over  allied  Europe,  1678,  343 

Louis  XV.,  King  of  France,  accession  of, 
1723,  405  ;  Duchess  of  Chateauroux 
and,  417,  418;  Fleury  and,  406;  last 

Cars  of,  509  ;  marriage  of,  to  Mary 
czinska,  1725,  406  ;  minority  of,  363, 
401  ;  supposed  fatal  illness  of,  at  Metz, 
1744,  418  ;  war  of  the  Austrian  succes- 
sion and,  417  ;  weakness  of  government 
of.  499 

Louis  XVI.,  King  of  France,  accession 
of,  1774,  511 

Louise  of  Savoy,  Queen-regent  of  France, 
and  the  treason  of  the  Constable  of 
Bourbon,  94 

Louvois,  Francois  Michel  le  Tellier,  Mar- 
quis of,  administration  of,  337  ;  cap- 
ture of  Strasburg  by,  1681,  344  ;  death 
of,  1691,  356 

Louvre,  palace  of,  construction  of,  377 


Loyola.    See  IGNATIUS  DE  LOYOLA 

Lubeck,  peace  of.  1626,  275 

Ludlow,  Edmund,  Republican  leader  in 
Ireland,  307 

Ludovico  il  Moro,  restoration  of  the 
university  of  Pavia  by.  140 

Lulli,  Jean  B.,  music  of,  377 

Luther,  Martin,  appeal  of,  to  a  general 
council,  164  ;  at  the  diet  of  Worms, 
165  ;  attack  by,  on  the  system  of  in- 
dulgences, 163  ;  Bible  translated  by, 
165,  166  ;  birth  of,  163  ;  bull  against, 
1520,  165  ;  Calvin  and,  187  ;  Colloquy 
of  Ratisbon  and,  190  ;  death  of,  1546, 
109,  169 

Lutherans,  struggles  of,  in  the  sixteenth 
century,  109,  269 

Lutheranism,  doctrines  of,  185  ;  in  the 
Netherlands,  Calvinism  displaces,  176 

Lutzen,  battle  of,  1632,  277 

Luxemburg,  Francois  H.  de  Montmo- 
renci,  Duke  of,  military  successes  of, 
1690-93,  356 

Luynes,  Albert  de,  favorite  of  Louis 
XIII.,  257 

MABLY,  GABRIEL  B.  DE,  481 

Machiavelli,  N.,  philosophy  of,  141 

"  Madame,"  applications  of  the  appella- 
tion, 368 

Madeira,  island  of,  discovery  of.  by  the 
Portuguese,  1419,  120 

Madrid,  treaty  of,  1526,  96 

Magdeburg,  siege  of,  by  Charles  V.,  170 

Magellan,  Ferdinand,  death  of,  127  ;  dis- 
covery of  Magellan's  Strait  by,  1520, 
127  ;  voyage  of,  important  results  of, 
127 

Maintz,  Archbishop  of,  and  the  sale  of 
indulgences,  163 

Malabar,  Portuguese  conquest  of,  1515, 
122 

Malacca,  Portuguese  conquest  of,  1511, 

122 

Malplaquet,  battle  of,  1709,  360 

Malta,  attack  upon,  by  Soule'iman  I., 
1565,  237 

Mamelukes,  Huguenots  and,  conflict  be- 
tween, at  Geneva,  1530.  174  ;  overthrow 
of,  by  the  Ottomans,  1516,  72 

Mansart,  Frangois,  and  Jules  H.,  works 
of,  376,  377 

Mansfield,  Ernst,  Count  of,  exploits  of, 
during  the  Thirty  Years'  War,  273 

Manufactures  in  England,  progress  of, 
under  Queen  Elizabeth,  243 

Manufactures  in  France  during  the  eigh- 
teenth century,  494  ;  progress  of,  under 
Henry  IV.,  248 

Manufactures  in  Spain,  in  the  eighteenth 
century,  504 

Manzo,  J.  B.,  Marquis  of  Villa,  Works 
of,  379 

Margaret  of  Anjou,  queen  of  Henry  VI. 
of  England,  flight  of,  to  Scotland,  1463, 
31  ;  popular  feeling  against,  29 

Margaret  of  Parma,  Philip  II.  and,  207 

Marguerite  of  France,  Princess,  marriage 
of,  to  Henry  IV.,  226 


INDEX. 


533 


Maria  Theresa,  Empress  of  the  West, 
accession  of,  1740,  414  ;  in  the  Hunga- 
rian diet,  1741,  416 ;  purchase  of  the 
succession  of  Bavaria  by,  1777,  433 

Mariana,  Juan  de,  380 

Marie  de  Medici,  imprisonment  of,  at 
Compiegne,  262  ;  regency  of,  255 

Marignano,  battle  of,  1515,  89 

Mariotte,  Edme,  discoveries  of,  384 

Marlborough,  John  Churchill,  Duke  of, 
disgrace  of,  361  ;  military  operations  of, 
during  the  war  of  the  Spanish  succes- 
sion, 359 

Marot,  Clement,  and  the  literature  of  the 
sixteenth  century,  144 

Marseilles,  repulse  of  Charles  V.  at, 
1536,  105 

Marston  Moor,  battle  of,  1644,  300 

Mary,  Queen  of  England,  marriage  of,  to 
Philip  II.  of  Spain,  112,  182;  re-estab- 
lishment of  Catholicism  by,  182 

Mary  Stuart,  Queen  of  Scots,  birth  of, 
107  ;  Duke  of  Norfolk  and,  215  ;  Earl 
of  Bothwell  and,  214;  Earl  of  Murray 
and,  213,  214;  execution  of,  1587,  217; 
forced  abdication  of,  214  ;  Guises  and, 
204  ;  imprisonment  of,  effects  of,  215  ; 
marriage  of,  to  Francis  II.,  204  ; 
marriage  of,  to  Henry  Darnley,  214  ; 
return  of,  from  France,  1561,  213; 
treatment  of,  by  Queen  Elizabeth,  315  \ 
trial  and  condemnation  of,  1586,  216 

Mary  of  England,  sister  of  Henry  VIII., 
marriage  of,  to  Louis  XII.  of  France,  88 

Mary  of  Burgundy,  marriage  of,  to  the 
Emperor  Maximilian,  22 

Masaccio  and  the  naturalist  school  of 
painting,  149 

Masham,  Abigail,  favorite  of  Queen 
Anne,  361 

Massillon,  Jean  B.,  Bishop  of  Clermont, 
oratory  of,  367 

"  Masters  of  petitions,"  French,  duties 
of,  336 

Mathias,  Emperor  of  the  West,  Rudolph 
II.  and,  271 

Matthiesen,  John,  Anabaptist  leader,  168 

Maurepas,  Jean  F.  Phelippeaux,  Count 
of,  ministry  of,  under  Louis  XVI.,  511 

Maurice,  Elector  of  Saxony,  double 
treachery  of,  no,  in,  170 

Maximilian,  Emperor  of  the  West, 
acquisition  of  territory  by  Austria 
under,  55  ;  Anne  of  Beaujeu  and,  25  ; 
character  and  reign  of,  53  ;  founding 
of  the  Aulic  Council  by,  54;  invasion 
of  Italy  by,  1495,  80;  marriage  of,  to 
Mary  of  Burgundy,  22 

Maximilian  II.,  Emperor  of  the  West, 
reign  of,  270 

Maximilian  of  Bavaria,  Catholic  League 
and,  269 

Mayenne,  Charles  of  Lorraine,  Duke  of, 
ambition  of,  233  ;  suppression  of  the 
"  Sixteen  "  by,  232 

Mazarin,  Jules,  Cardinal,  Anne  of 
Austria  and,  311  ;  death  of,  1661,  320  ; 
ministry  of,  312,  319  ;  patronage  of  art 
and  letters  by,  319 


Mazeppa,  alliance  of,  with  Charles  XII., 
1708,  392 

Medici,  Cosmo  I.  de,  Florence  under,  62 

Medici,  Giovanni  J.  de,  devastation  of 
Tuscany  by,  1554,  112 

Medici,  Lorenzo  de,  conspiracy  of  the 
Pazzis  against,  63 

Medici,  Pietro  II.  de,  and  Savonarola,  64 

Mediterranean  Sea,  Ottomans  and,  in  the 
sixteenth  century,  237 

Meistersanger  school  in  German  liter- 
ature, 145 

Mercy,  Francois,  Baron  of,  military  oper- 
ations of,  282 

Merle  d'Aubigne  and  the  literature  of 
the  sixteenth  century,  145 

Metz,  siege  of,  by  Charles  V.,  1552,  112 

Mexico,  conquest  of,  by  Cortes,  1519,  126; 
discovery  of,  by  Grijalva,  1518,  126 ; 
war  of  independence  in,  1810,  outbreak 
of,  131 

Mexico,  city  of,  capture  of,  by  Cortes, 
1510.  126 

Mezieres,  defense  of,  by  the  Chevalier 
Bayard.  1520,  93 

Michael  Angelo,  and  Bramante,  147  ;  as  a 
poet,  150  ;  influence  of,  on  the  Renais- 
sance, 149  ;  Raphael  and,  153 

Middle  Ages  and  modern  times,  bound- 
ary between,  i 

Mignard,  Pierre,  largest  fresco  in  Europe 
bys  377 

Milan,  printing  established  at,  1469,  139  ; 
surrender  of,  to  Francis  I.,  1524,  95 

Milanais,  the,  and  the  Sforza  dynasty,  58  ; 
Austrian  campaigns  against,  1701-02, 
359  ;  conquest  of,  by  France,  1500,  82  ; 
1734,  408  ;  submission  of,  to  Francis  I. 
of  France,  1515,  89;  usurpation  of  the 
government  of,  by  Ludovico  Sforza,  81 

Milton,  John,  379 

Minard,  President,  assassination  of,  179 

Missions,  early,  in  America,  132 

Modern  times  and  Middle  Ages,  bound- 
ary between,  i 

Mohammed,  the  Prophet,  standard  of, 
transferred  to  the  Ottomans,  73 

Mohammed  II.,  Sultan  of  the  Ottomans, 
conquest  of  Albania  by,  70 ;  conquest 
of  the  Greek  empire  by,  69  ;  defeat  of 
Ouzoun  Hassan  by,  70 ;  reign  of,  67  ; 
siege  of  Belgrade  by,  52,  69 

Moliere,  Jean  B.  Poquelin,  called,  works 
of,  371 

Monastic  orders,  suppression  of,  in  Eng- 
land, 1536.  180 

Mongon,  treaty  of,  1626,  260 

Monge,  Gaspard,  473 

Monk,  George,  and  the  restoration  of  the 
English  monarchy,  309 

Monmouth,  James,  Duke  of,  invasion  of 
England  by,  1685,  352 

"  Monsieur,"  applications  of  the  appella- 
tion, 368 

Montaigne,  M.,  and  the  literature  of  the 
sixteenth  century,  144 

Montbeillard,  Gueneau  de,  476 

Montcalm  de  St.Veran,  Louis  J.,  Marquis 
of,  campaigns  and  death  of,  430 


534 


INDEX. 


Montcontour,  defeat  of  the  Protestants 
at,  1569,  224 

Montespan, Franchise  A.,  Marchioness  de, 
sons  of,  declared  heirs  to  the  crown,  363 

Montesquieu,  Charles  de  Secondat,  Baron 
of,  works  of,  480 

Montezuma,  Emperor  of  Mexico,  seizure 
of,  by  Cortes,  i5iq,  126 

Montgolfier,  Jacques  E.,  inventor  of  air- 
balloons,  474 

Montmorency,  Anne  de,  Constable  of 
France,  death  of,  223  ;  devastation  of 
Provence  by,  at  the  approach  of  Charles 
V.,  1536,  105  ;  invasion  of  the  Nether- 
lands by,  1556,  113  ;  taken  prisoner  at 
St.  Quentin,  1557,  114 

Montmorency,  Henri  II.,  Duke  of,  exe- 
cution of,  1632,  262 

Montpensier,  Gilbert  de,  80 

Montrose,  James  Graham,  Marquis  of, 
execution  of,  1650,  304 

Moors  in  Spain,  end  of  domination  of,  43 

More,  Thomas,  Erasmus  the  guest  of,  145 

Morgagni,  Giovanni  B.,  476 

Motteville,  Mme.  Franchise  B.  de. 
"  Memoirs,"  369 

Mourad  II..  Sultan  of  the  Ottomans, 
revolt  of  the  Janissaries  under,  68 

Munich,  Burkhard  C.,  military  career  of, 
in  Russia,  458 

Muhlburg,  battle  of,  1547,  169 

Munzer,  Thomas,  and  the  Anabaptists, 
167 

Murner,  Thomas.     "  Bark  of  Fools,"  146 

Murray,  James  Stuart,  Earl  of,  Mary 
Stuart  and,  213,  214 

Music,  religious,  Palestrina  and.  157 

Musical  instruments,  development  of,  in 
the  sixteenth  century,  156 

NANTES,  edict  of.  guarantees  of,  234  ; 
revocation  of,  by  Louis  XIV.,  1685, 
346 

Napier,  John,  385 

Naples,  Academy  of,  restoration  of,  by 
Valla  and  Pontano,  140 

Naples,  cession  of,  to  the  Queen  of  Spain, 
1505,  83;  devastation  of  the  coasts  of, 
by  Barbaroussa,  1537,  105  ;  reforms  in, 
under  Charles  VIII-i  504 ;  siege  of, 
1527,  158 ;  submission  of,  to  Charles 
VIII.  of  France,  1495,  79 ;  surrender 
of,  to  Louis  XII.  of  France,  1501,  82  ; 
under  Ferdinand  I.,  66 

Narbonne,  treaty  of,  77 

Narva,  defeat  of  the  Russians  at,  by 
Charles  XII.  of  Sweden,  1700,  391 

Naseby,  battle  of,  1645,  300 

Navarre,  struggle  for,  1520,  93 

Navigation  Act,  English,  of  1651,  Hol- 
land and,  305 

Necker,  Jacques,  ministry  of.  512 

Nemours,  Gaston  de  Foix,  Duke  of, 
Italian  campaigns  and  death  of,  87 

Nemours,  Louis  d'Armagnac,  Duke  of, 
Viceroy  of  Naples,  83 

Netherlands,  Calvinism  in,  176  ;  England 
and,  treaty  between,  1585,  216  ;  French 
conquests  in,  1745-46,  418  ;  invasion  of, 


by  Henry  II.  of  France,  1554,  112  ;  in- 
vasion of,  by  Montmorency,  1556,  113  ; 
invasion  of,  by  Louis  XIV.,  1667,  339  ; 
1691,  356  ;  Reformation  of  the  sixteenth 
century  in,  176  ;  religious  war  of  the 
sixteenth  century  in,  206  ;  wealth  of, 
in  the  sixteenth  century,  207 

Neutrality,  armed,  league  of,  1780,  453 

New  World,  discovery  of,  far-reaching 
influence  of,  134  ;  division  of,  between 
Spain  and  Portugal,  127 

Newcastle,  Thomas  H.  Pelham,  Duke  of, 
Earl  of  Chatham  and,  438 

Newfoundland,  discovery  of,  by  John 
Cabot,  1497,  128  ;  occupation  of,  in 
1524,  in  the  name  of  France,  128 

Newton,  Sir  Isaac,  discoveries  of,  383 

Nice,  bombardment  of,  by  Souleiman  I., 
1543,  107  ;  truce  of,  1538,  106 

Nicolas,  Italian  sculptor,  148 

Nicole,  Pierre,  works  of,  373 

Nimeguen,  treaty  of,  1678,  343 

Noailles,  Adrien  M.,  Duke  of,  Marshal  of 
France,  war  of  the  Austrian  succession 
and,  417 

Norfolk,  Thomas  Howard,  Duke  of,  in- 
trigues and  execution  of,  215 

Normandy,  cession  and  retaking  of,  by 
Louis  XL,  13 

North  America,  English  colonization  in, 
446 

Nuremberg,  peace  or  interim  of,  1532,  167 

Nymphenburg,  treaty  of,  1741,  415 

OATES,TITUS,  and  the  Popish  Plot,  350 

Odensee,  diet  of,  1527,  173 

Olaus,  Lutheran  preacher,  honors  be- 
stowed upon,  by  Gustavus  I.,  172 

Opera,  first  performance  of,  1599,  157 

Opitz,  Martin,  379 

Orange,  color  of  the  Protestant  party, 
1688,  354 

Orinoco  River,  discovery  of,  by  Colum- 
bus. 1498,  125 

Orleans,  Louis  II.,  Duke  of.  See  Lot/is 
XII.,  KING  OF  FRANCE 

Orleans,  Philippe,  Duke  of,  alliance  of, 
with  George  I.  of  England,  402  ;  death 
of,  1723,  406 ;  regency  of,  401 

Orleans,  truce  of,  1514,  88 

Otranto,  seizure  of,  by  the  Ottomans, 
1480,  58 

Ottoman  empire,  condition  of,  in  1661, 
3-27  ;  decline  of,  in  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, 460 ;  European  alliance  against, 
1532,  102  ;  extension  of,  under  Soulei- 
man I.,  101,  106;  France  and,  alliance 
of,  effects  of,  101  ;  France  and,  alliance 
of,  renounced  by  Louis  XIV.,  339  ;  from 
1453  to  1520,  67  ;  wars  of,  against  Aus- 
tria, in  the  seventeenth  century,  413 

Ottomans,  defeat  of,  in  the  Gulf  of  Le- 
panto,  1571,  237  ;  invasion  of  Russia 
by,  1710,  393  ;  Mediterranean  and,  in 
the  sixteenth  century,  237  ;  siege  of 
Candia  by,  324.  See  also  TURKEY 

PAINTING,  development  of,  during  the 
Renaissance,  148  ;  European  schools 


INDEX. 


535 


of,  in  the  seventeenth    century,  381  ; 

Giottesque  school  of,  148 
Palestrina,    influence    of,    on    religious 

music,  157 
Papacy,  condition  of,  in  the  second  half 

of  the  fifteenth  century,  64  ;  under  the 

treaty  of  1559,  TI5  :   at  tne  middle  of 

the  sixteenth  century,  189 
Paper,  early  manufacture  of,  139 
Papin,  Denis,  inventions  of,  384 
Pare  aux  cerfs,  501 
Parchment  and  the  invention  of  printing, 

139 
Paris,  siege  of,  by  Henry  III.  and  Henry 

IV.,  1589,  231  ;  surrender  of,  to  Conde, 

1652,  317  ;  treaty  of,  1763,  431 
Paris-Duverney, brothers,  French  finances 

under,  406 
Parliament,  English,  arbitrary  powers  of, 

in  the  fifteenth  century,  27  ;  Charles  I. 

and,  292  ;  expulsion  of,    by  Cromwell, 


under  Queen  Elizabeth,  242 
Parliament  of  Paris,  demands  of,   1643, 

3*3 

Parliaments,  French,  312 
Parma,  Duke  of.     See  FARNESE,  ALEX- 
ANDER 
Parmentier,  Antoine  A.,   scientific  work 

of,  476 
Pascal,  Blaise,   influence  of,   on  science, 

383  ;  works  of,  373 
Passau,  compromise  of,  1552,  HI,  170 
Patkul,  J.  Reynold,  Peter  the  Great  and, 

390 
Paul  III.,  Pope,  reforms  in  the  Catholic 

Church  under,  189 
Paul    IV.,    Pope,    and     Henry     II.    of 

France,  113  ;  director  of  the  Council  of 

Trent,   1545,   195  :  Italian  liberty  and, 

196  ;    submission   of,   to   the   Duke   of 

Alva,  1557,  114 
Paulette,  right  of,  247 
Pavia,  University  of,  restoration  of,  by 

Ludovico  il  Moro,  140 
Paz/is,  conspiracy  of,  63 
Peasants'  war  in  Germany,  1525,  167 
Pensacola,  capture  of,  by  the  Spaniards, 

1781,  454 
Peronne,  castle  of,  imprisonment  of  Louis 

XI.  in,  15  ;  treaty  of,  15  ;  nullification 

of,  1 6 
Perpignan,    siege     and    capture    of,    by 

Louis  XI.,  1474,  21 
Perrault,  Claude,  works  of,  376 
Persecutions  in  England  under  Charles  I., 

294;     under    Queen     Elizabeth,     216 ; 

under   Henry  VIII.,  181  ;  under  James 

I.,  287  ;  under  Mary,  183 
Persecutions  in  France  in  the   sixteenth 

century,  179  ;    in   the    eighteenth  cen- 
tury, 496 
Persia,    massacres    in,  by   the   Ottoman 

armies,  1514,  72 

Peru,  conquest  of,  by  Pizarro,  1529-35, 128 
Perugino  and   the     Umbrian    school    of 

painting,  149 


Peter  I.,  the  Great,  Czar  of  Russia,  bar- 
barous punishment  of  rebels  by,  388  ; 
campaigns  of,  against  the  Swedes, 
1700-09,  392  ;  death  of,  1725,  399 ; 
despotic  rule  of,  397  ;  expedition 
against  Persia  by,  1722,  399  ;  industrial 
development  of  Russia  under,  396 ;  re- 
forms instituted  by,  389  ;  seizure  of  the 
government  by,  1680,  388  ;  "  testa- 
ment "  of,  309  ;  travels  of,  388,  395 

Peter  III.,  Czar  of  Russia,  accession  of, 
1762,  428  ;  murder  of,  459 

Protestants,  liberty  of  conscience  granted 
to,  at  Passau,  1552 

Philip  II.,  King  of  Spain,  accession  of, 
1556,  112  ;  alliance  of,  with  the  Duke 
of  Guise,  1584,  230;  alliance  of,  with 
Sweden  and  Poland,  239  ;  character  of, 
202  ;  Charles  V.  and,  contrast  between, 
239  ;  Christian  II.  of  Denmark  and, 
238  ;  conquest  of  Portugal  by,  235  ; 
death  of,  241  ;  designs  of,  on  the  crown 
of  France,  1593,  233 ;  Eric  XIV.  and, 
238  ;  extent  of  empire  of,  201  ;  Hague 
and,  truce  between,  1609,  211  ;  Inquisi- 
tion established  in  America  by,  134  ; 
mafc-iage  of,  to  Mary,  Queen  of  Eng- 
land, 112, 182  ;  policy  of,  in  the  Nether- 
lands, 207 ;  proposal  of  marriage  to 
8ueen  Elizabeth  by,  212  ;  viceroy  of 
harles  V.  at  Rome,  1547,  no 

Philip  V.,  King  of  Spain,  proclamation 
of,  1700,  358  ;  reign  of,  503 

Philip  I.,  Landgrave  of  Hesse,  surrender 
of,  at  Muhlburg,  1547,  169 

Philippine  Islands,  discovery  of,  by  Ma- 
gellan, 1521,  127 

Philosophical  works  of  the  seventeenth 
century,  380 

Piacenza,  battle  of,  1745,  419 

Pjcard,  Jean,  discoveries  by,  385 

Piedmont,  defense  of,  by  Brissac,  1554, 
H2  ;  recapture  of,  by  Francis  I.,  105  ; 
surrender  of,  to  Charles  V.,  104 

Pigalle,  Jean  B.  de,  482 

Pilon,  Germain,  French  architect,  155 

Pinel,  Philippe,  and  the  treatment  of  the 
insane,  476 

Pirates,  Barbary,  suppression  of,  by  Louis 
XIV.,  344  ;  Ottoman,  in  the  Mediter- 
ranean, 1535,  103 

Pius  II.,  Pope,  resistance  of  Ottoman  in- 
vasion by,  57,  69 

Pius  V.,  Pope,  Queen  Elizabeth  excom- 
municated by,  1570,  215  ;  reform  of  the 
Catholic  Church  under,  197 

Pizarro,  assassination  of,  1541,  128;  con- 
quest of  Peru  by,  1529-35,^  128 

Plato  and  Aristotle  in  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury, 141 

Poissy,  Colloquy  of,  230 

Poland  at  the  opening  of  _  the  Thirty 
Years'  War,  267  ;  condition  of,  1661, 
327;  conquest  of,  by  Charles  XII.  of 
Sweden,  1702,  391  ;  invasion  of,  by 
Charles  Gustavus,  1656,  325  ;  invasion 


of  1768,  462  ;  partition  of,  1771,  461  ; 
partition  of,  second,  1793,  467  ;  par- 
tition of,  third,  1795,  468  ;  Russia's  first 


536 


INDEX. 


step  toward  the  acquisition  of,  1667, 
327  ;  weakness  of,  in  the  eighteenth 
century,  461 

Pombal,  Sebastian  J.  C.  Melho,  Marquis 
of,  ministry  of,  502 

Pomerania,  capture  of,  by  Gustavus  Adol- 
phus,  1630,  276 

Pompadour,  Jeanne  A.  Poisson,  Mar- 
chioness of,  Seven  Years'  War  and, 
426 

Pondicherry,  defense  of,  1748,  421 

Poniatowski,  Stanislaus  Augustus,  last 
King  of  Poland,  462 

Pope,  Alexander,  379 

Portugal,  alliance  of,  with  Siam.  121  ;  and 
Spam,  colonization  methods  of,  129, 
136 ;  discoveries  by,  in  the  fifteenth 
and  sixteenth  centuries,  great  results 
of,  134  ;  division  of  the  New  World 
between,  127 ;  colonies  of,  Catholic 
Church  in,  133  ;  commerce  of,  with  the 
East,  rapid  development  of,  123  ;  con- 
dition of,  at  the  middle  of  the  fifteenth 
century,  49  ;  in  1661,  322  ;  condition  of , 
under  Spanish  rule,  in  the  sixteenth 
century,  236 ;  conquest  of,  by  Philip 
II.,  235  ;  England  and,  treatf  be- 
tween, 1703,  435  ;  reforms  attempted 
in,  under  Joseph  I.,  502 

Port  Royal,  school  of,  373 

Portuguese  literature  in  the  seventeenth 
century,  379 

Posts,  letter,  establishment  of,  by  Louis 
XI.  of  France,  1464,  136 

Poussin,  Nicolas,  works  of,  374 

Prado,  treaty  of,  1728,  403 

Prague,  retreat  of  Belle  Isle  from,  1742, 
417  ;  treaty  of,  1635,  278 

Praguerie,  the,  in  France,  10 

Presbyterians,  Cromwell  and,  302 

Press,  censorship  of,  in  France,  during 
the  eighteenth  century,  496 

Prie,  Jeanne  A.  de  Berthelot,  Marchion- 
ess of.  Duke  of  Bourbon  and,  406 

Priestley,  Joseph,  chemical  work  of,  475 

Printing,  in  France,  advance  of,  under 
Francis  I.,  144  ;  invention  of,  138  ;  in- 
fluence of,  upon  education,  140 

Privateers,  English,  in  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury, 215 

Protective  tariff  in  France,  inauguration 
of,  by  Colbert,  332 

Protestant  princes  in  Germany,  perfidy 
and  cruelty  of  Charles  V.  to,  no ; 
secret  alliance  of  Henry  II.  of  France 
with,  in 

Protestants  and  Catholics,  conflict  be- 
tween, opening  of,  169  ;  origin  of  name, 
167 

Protestantism,  economic  effect  of,  188  ; 
in  France,  barbarous  measures  for  the 
suppression  of,  under  Henry  II.,  in  ; 
during  the  eighteenth  century,  496 

Provence,  invasion  of,  by  Charles  V., 
1536,  104 

"Prudents,"  French  political  party,  for- 
mation of,  228 

Prussia,  coalition  against,  1756,  424  ; 
coasts  of,  capture  of,  by  Gustavus 


Adolphus,  7652,  276  ;  condition  of,  at 
the  close  of  the  Seven  Years'  War,  432  ; 
France  and,  in  the  war  of  the  Austrian 
succession,  415 ;  growth  of,  under 
Frederick  the  Great,  423,  432  ;  house  of 
Hohenzollern  and,  1417-1640,  409  ;  ori- 
gin of  the  kingdom  of,  1417,  409  ;  recog- 
nition of,  as  a  kingdom,  under  the 
treaty  of  Utrecht,  1713,  411  ;  refuge  for 
Protestants  under  Frederick  William  1., 
4'3 

Pruth,  treaty  of,  1711,  393 

Prynne,  William,  heroism  of,  294 

Puerto  Bello,  New  Granada,  commerce 
of,  sixteenth  century,  131 

Pufendorf,  Samuel,  380 

Pugatscheff,  Yemelka,  insurrection  and 
execution  of,  464 

Puget,  Pierre,  works  of,  375 

Pultowa,  defeat  of  Charles  XII.  at,  1709, 
393 

Punishments,  barbarous,  in  France,  in 
the  eighteenth  century,  487 

Puritans,  emigration  of ,  to  America,  1620, 
288  ;  rapid  increase  of,  under  Charles 
I.,  294 

Pyrenees,  treaty  of,  1659,  31" 

8fEBEC,  battle  of,  1759,  430 
uesnay,   Francois,    economic     theories 
of,  481 
Quito,  capture  of,  by  the  Portuguese,  128 

RABELAIS,  F.,  and  the  literature  of  the 
sixteenth  century,  144 

Racine,  Jean,  works  of,  370 

Rameau,  Jean  P.,  musical  work  of,  483 

Rancoux,  battle  of.  1746,  419 

Raphael,  Michael  Angelo  and,  153 ; 
works  of,  153 

Rastadt,  treaty  of,  1714,  362 

Rathmines,  battle  of.  1649,  303 

Ratisbon,  diet  of,  1684,  346 

Ravaillac,  Francois,  assassination  of 
Henry  IV.  by,  252 

Raynal,  Guillaume  T.  F.,  Abbe,  works 
of,  481 

Reaumur,  Frne  A.  Ferchault  de,  scien- 
tific work  of,  474 

Reform  in  France,  attempts  at,  484 

Reformation  of  the  sixteenth  century, 
Charles  V.  and,  167,  169,  176  ;  in  Eng- 
land, 180  ;  in  France,  176  ;  in  Germany, 
160  ;  in  the  Netherlands,  176 ;  in 
northern  Europe,  171  ;  in  Scotland, 
179 ;  in  Switzerland,  174  ;  results  of, 
184 

Reformed  Church  of  Scotland,  democratic 
tendencies  of,  186  ;  organization  of,  by 
Knox,  180 

Regale,  the,  Louis  XIV.  and,  345 

Regnier,  M.,  and  the  literature  of  the 
sixteenth  century,  144 

Religious  toleration  in  Austria,  edict  for, 
1781,  507  ;  in  the  Ottoman  empire,  68 

Religious  wars  of  the  sixteenth  century, 
theater  of,  204 

Renaissance  of  the  arts,  147  ;  of  letters, 
140 


INDEX. 


537 


Requesens,  Luis  de,  unsuccessful  cam- 
paigns of,  in  the  Netherlands,  209 
Retz,  Jean  F.  P.  de  Gondi,  Cardinal,  im- 
prisonment of,  1652,  317  ;  "  Memoirs," 
369  ;  plot  of,  against  Anne  of  Austria, 
3J4 

Rhodes,  Knights  of,  warfare  of,  on  the 
pirates  of  the  Mediterranean,  104 

Richard  III.,  King  of  England,  Anne  of 
Beaujeu  and,  25  ;  usurpation  of  the 
throne  by,  33 

Richelieu,  Armand  J.  du  Plessis,  Car- 
dinal, attack  on  England  by,  1624,  260; 
condition  of  France  under,  263  ;  death 
of,  1642,  265  ;  Gustavus  Adolphus  and, 
276  ;  influence  of,  over  Louis  XIII., 
259  ;  Marie  de  Medici  attempts  the 
overthrow  of,  261  ;  "  Memoirs,"  369  ; 
military  successes  of,  264  ;  patronage  of 
art  and  letters  by,  265  ;  Thirty  Years' 
War  and,  278  ;  Wallenstein's  removal 
secured  by,  1630,  276  ;  war  of,  upon  the 
Huguenots,  260 

Richelieu,  Louis  F.  A.  du  Plessis,  Duke 
of,  Marshal  of  France,  Seven  Years' 
War  and,  424 

Rochelle,  capture  of,  by  Richelieu,  1628, 
261  ;  confession  of,  226  :  peace  of,  1572, 
228 

Rocroy,  battle  of,  1643,  281 

Rodney,  Admiral  George  B.,  Lord,  naval 
exploits  of,  453 

Roemer,  Olaus,  384         * 

Rohan,  Henri,  Duke  of,  Huguenot  rising 
under,  258 

Roman  Catholic.     See  CATHOLIC 

Rome  in  the  second  half  the  fifteenth 
century,  64 ;  printing  established  at, 
1465,  139  ;  sack  of,  under  the  Constable 
Bourbon,  1526,  97  ;  submission  of,  to 
Charles  VIII.  of  France,  1494,  78; 
University  of,  re-establishment  of,  by 
Pope  Eugenius  IV.,  140 

Romorantin,  edict  of,  219 

Ronsard,  Pierre  de,  and  the  literature  of 
the  sixteenth  century,  144 

Roskild,  treaty  of,  1658,  326 

"  Rosnis,"  origin  of  the  appellation,  249 

Rossbach,  battle  of,  1757,  426 

Rota,  tribunal  of,  at  Rome,  190 

Rotrou,  Jean  de,  works  of,  370 

Rouen,  early  explorers  from,  119 

Rousseau,  Jean  J.,  on  the  government  of 
France  in  the  eighteenth  century,  501  ; 
works  of,  480 

Roussillon,  and  Cerdagne,  surrender  of, 
to  Louis  XI.  of  France,  1462,  n  ;  cap- 
ture of,  by  the  French,  1642,  280 

Royalty  and  modern  society,  484 

Rudolph  II.,  Emperor  of  the  West, 
Mathias  and,  271 

Ruel,  convention  of,  1649,  315 

Rupert,  Prince,  defeat  of,  by  Cromwell, 
1644,  300 

Russell,  William,  execution  of,  1683,  351 

Russia,  alliances  of,  under  the  treaty  of 
Amsterdam,  395,  396  ;  condition  of,  in 
1661,  327;  condition  of,  at  the  opening 
of  the  Thirty  Years'  War,  267  ;  con- 


dition of,  at  the  opening  of  the  eigh- 
teenth century,  387 ;  from  Peter  the 
Great  to  Catherine  II.,  457  ;  industrial 
development  of,  under  Peter  the  Great, 
396  ;  invasion  of,  by  the  Ottomans, 
1710,  333  ;  reforms  attempted  in,  under 
Catherine  1 1 .,  508  ;  Seven  Years1  War 
and,  428  ;  Turkey  and,  1768,  463  ; 
Turkey  and,  war  between,- 1695,  388 

Rutland,  Count  of,  son  of  Richard  Plan- 
tagenet,  murder  of,  31 

Rye  House  Plot  and  executions  of  Sid- 
ney and  Russell,  1683,  351 

Ryswick,  peace  of,  1697,  357 

SACHS,  HANS,  146 

St.   Andrew,   order  of,   founding   of,   by 

Peter  the  Great.  389 
St.    Bartholomew's    Day,    massacre    of, 

1572,  227 

St.  Denis,  battle  of,  1567,  223 
St.  Denis,  Cathedral  of,  233 
St.  Germain,  Claude  L.,  Count  of,  cam- 
paigns of,  in  the  Seven  Years'  War,  427 
St.  Germain,  treaty  of,  1570,  225 
St.  Jean  de  Ulloa,   Mexico.     See  VERA 

CRUZ 

St.  Menehould,  treaty  of,  1613,  256 
St.   Peter's  Church,   Rome,   indulgences 

granted  to  contributors  to,  163 
St.  Petersburg,  founding  of,  by  Peter  the 

Great,  396 

St.  Pol,  Count  of,  execution  of,  1475,  22 
St.   Quentin,   defeat  of    the   French  at, 

1557*  "4 
St.  Simon,  Louis  de  Rouvroy,  Duke  of. 

"  Memoirs,"  370 

Salt  tax,  orgaMOf,  in  France,  486 
Saluzzo,  Marquis  of,  treachery  of,  104 
Samson,  Nicolas,  384 
Santa  Fe,  Spain,  founding  of,  44 
Sardinia,  reforms  in,   in   the  eighteenth 

century,  506 

Sarpi,  Pietro  :  "  Fra  Paolo,"  380 
"  Satire  M^nippee,"  366 
Savonarola  and  Charles  VIII.  of  France, 

78  ;  and  Pietro  II.  de  Medici,  64 
Savoy,  Charles  III.,  Duke  of,  104 
Savoy,  Charles  Emanuel  II.,  Duke  of, 

Louis  XIV.  and,  357 
Savoy,  restoration  of,  by  Henry  II.  under 

the  treaty  of  1559,  115  ;  seizure  of,  by 

Francis  I.,  1535,  104 
Saxe,     Maurice,   Count   of,    Marshal    of 

France,  war  of  the  Austrian  succession 
'  and,  417 

Scanderbeg,  Prince  of  Albania,  70 
Scheele,  Karl  W.,  chemical  work  of,  475 
Schiites  and  Sunnites,  72 
Schinner,  Mathieu,  Cardinal  of  Sion,  89 
Schism,  religious,  in   England,  origin  of, 

1 80 
Schoeffer,   Peter,   invention   of    printing 

by,  138 
Science,  development  of,  in  the  sixteenth 

century,  157  ;  in  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury, 382  ;  in  the  eighteenth  century, 

471 
Scotland,   alliance  of,  with  Francis  I.  of 


538 


INDEX. 


France,  100,  103  ;  Charles  II.  declared 
king  of,  1649,  303  ;  Catholicism  in, 
downfall  of,  212  ;  England  and,  union 
of,  1707,  435  ;  Reformation  of  the  six- 
teenth century  in,  179  ;  revolt  in,  1680, 
35' 

Sculpture,  Italian,  development  of,  148 

Sebastian,  King  of  Portugal,  death  of,  in 
Africa,  235 

Sevastopol,  naval  battle  at,  1788,  466 

Seine  and  Loire  rivers,  canal  between, 
constructed  by  Henry  IV.,  137 

Selim  the  Ferocious,  Sultan  of  the  Otto- 
mans, poisoning  of  his  relatives  by,  72 

Senlis,  treaty  of,  1493,  55,  77 

Servetus,  Michael,  burning  of,  175 

Seven  Years'  War,  422  ;  results  of,  431  ; 
taxation  of  the  American  colonies  and, 
44.8 

Sevigne,  Marie  de  Rabutin,  Marchioness 
de,  on  Racine.  370 

Seville,  treaty  of,  1729,  403 

Sforza  dynasty,  Milan  and,  58 

Sforza,  Ludovico  il  Moro,  and  Charles 
VIII.  of  France,  78  ;  captivity  and 
death  of,  82  ;  usurpation  of  government 
of  Milan  by,  81 

Shakspere,  William,  works  of,  244,  379 

Shoe,  association  of,  in  Germany,  166 

Siam,  Portuguese  alliance  with,  121 

Sidney,  Algernon,  execution  of,  1683,  351 

Siena,  restoration  of,  to  the  Medici,  under 
the  treaty  of  1559,  115;  siege  and 
capitulation  of,  1554-55,  112 

Silesia,  conquest  of,  by  Frederick  the 
Great,  1740,  4.15 

Sistova,  peace  of,  1791,  466 

"  Sixteen,"  faction  of,  suppression  of, 
1592,  232 

Sixtus  V.,  Pope,  reforms  and  improve- 
ments under,  198 

Slave  trade,  African,  beginning  of,  1517, 
132 

Slavonia,  conquest  of,  by  Soule'iman  I., 
1531,  102 

Smalkalde,  diet  of,  1531,  167  ;  League  of, 
against  Charles  V.,  1532,  102  ;  dis- 
ruption of,  no 

Smith,  Adam,  economic  theories  of,  482 

Scares  d'Albergaria,  Lopez,  conquests  by, 
in  India,  1515-18,  122 

Society,  modern,  influence  of  royalty 
upon,  484 

Society  of  Jesus.     See  JESUITS 

Socotora,  capture  of,  by  Albuquerque, 
1507,  121 

Soissons,  Charles  de  Bourbon,  Count  of, 
death  of,  1641,  262 

Soleure,  treaty  of,  19 

Solis,  Antonio  de,  380 

Somme,  cities  of  the,  ransom  of,  by 
Louis  XI.,  ii 

Sophia,  Princess,  confinement  of,  in  a 
convent,  by  Peter  the  Great,  388 

Soubise,  Charles  de  Rohan,  Prince  of, 
Marshal  of  France,  campaigns  of,  in 
the  Seven  Years'  War,  425 

Soufflot,  Jacques  G.,  architectural  work 
of,  482 


Souleiman  I.,  Sultan  of  the  Ottomans, 
accession  of,  74  ;  alliance  of,  with  Ven- 
ice, 123  ;  and  Charles  V.,  conflict  be- 
tween, over  Hungary,  1529,  167  ;  and 
Charles  V.,  truce  between,  1545,  109  ; 
attack  upon  Malta  by,  1565,  237  ;  bom- 
bardment of  Nice  by,  1543,  107  ;  con- 
quest of  Hungary  by,  1529,  101  ;  con- 
quest of  Slavonia  by,  1531,  102  ;  defeat 
of  the  Austrians  by,  at  Essek,  1537, 

105  ;  extension  of  the  Ottoman  empire 
under,   101.   106  ;  futile  attempt  of,  to 
dislodge  the  Portuguese,  in  India,  1538, 
122  ;    recapture  of  Hungary   by,   1541, 

106  ;  siege  of  Guns  by,  1532,  102  ;  siege 
of  Vienna  by,  1529,  101 

Spain,  acquisitions  of  territory  by,  in  the 
fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries,  46 ; 
colonies  of,  Catholic  Church  in,  133  ; 
colonies  of,  cultivation  of  European 
products  forbidden  in,  131  ;  condition 
of,  at  the  middle  of  the  fifteenth  cen- 
tury, 40 ;  condition  of,  at  the  death  of 
Philip  II.,  1598,  241  ;  1661,  322;  Eng- 
land and,  religious  war  between,  in  the 
sixteenth  century,  212,  215  ;  France  and, 
war  between,  seventeenth  century,  317  ; 
1718-20,  40-.;  ;  inquisition  in,  134  ;  Por- 
tugal and,  colonization  methods  of, 
129,  136  ;  Portugal  and,  discoveries  by, 
in  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries, 
great  results  of,  134  ;  Portugal  and, 
division  of  th*e  New  World  between, 
127  ;  reforms  attempted  in,  under  Fer- 
dinand VI.  and  Charles  III.,  503  ;  treaty 
of  Paris  and,  1763,  432 

Spallanzani,  Lazaro,  scientific  work  of, 
476 

Spanish  literature  in  the  seventeenth 
century,  379 

Spanish  succession,  war  of,  357  ;  results 
of.  363 

Spires,  diet  of,  1529,  167 

Stahl,  Georg  E.,  phlogiston  theory  of,  474 

Stamp  tax,  British,  of  1765,  revocation  of, 

449 
Star  Chamber,  revival   of,  under   Henry 

VII.,  35 

States  General  of  Denmark,  suppression 
of,  by  the  aristocracy,  1540,  173  ;  of 
France,  convocation  of,  1614,  256 

Sten  Sture,  last  Swedish  administrator, 
death  of,  1520,  171 

Stockholm,  siege  of,  by  Gustavus  I., 
1523,  171 

Strafford,  Thomas  Wentworth,  Earl  of, 
organization  of  a  standing  army  in  Ire- 
land by,  295  ;  trial  and  execution  of, 
1641,  296 

Stralsund,  siege  of,  1715,  394 

Strasburg,  capture  of,  by  Louvois,  1681, 

344. 

Slrelitzi,  revolt  of,  1698,  388 

Stuart,  Charles  E.,  the  Pretender,  out- 
break under,  1745,  437 

Stuart,  James  F.  E.,  the  Pretender,  out- 
break under,  1715,  435 

Sualem,  Rennequin,  engineering  work 
of,  at  Versailles,  378 


INDEX. 


539 


Sueur.    See  LE  SUEUR 
Suffolk,  Duke  of,  murder  of,  29 
Sully,  Maximilien  de  Bethune,  Duke  of, 
economic  measures  of,  247  ;   sent  into 
retirement  by  Marie  de  Medici,  256 
Sunnites  and  Schiites,  72 
Susa,  treaty  of,  265 

Sweden,  alliance  of,  with  Francis  I.  of 
France,  1541,  107;  and  the  partition  of 
Poland,  469  ;  Christian  II.  seizes  the 
crown  of,  171  ;  coalition  against,  1699, 
390  ;  condition  of,  at  the  opening  of  the 
Thirty  Years'  War,  268  ;  condition  of, 
in  1661,  325  ;  condition  of,  at  the  open- 
ing of  the  eighteenth  century,  387  ; 
condition  of,  after  the  war  with  Russia, 
1700-15,  3Q4 ;  development  of,  under 
Gustavus  I.,  173  ;  partition  of  territory 
of,  under  the  treaty  of  Nystadt,  1721, 
395  ;  reforms  in,  in  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, 508  ;  Reformation  of  the  sixteenth 
century  in,  172  ;  results  of  the  Thirty 
Years'  War  to,  284 
Swenska  Sound,  battle  of,  1790,  469 
Switzerland,  condition  of,  1661,  325 ; 
Reformation  of  the  sixteenth  century 
in,  174  ;  religious  war  in,  1528-31,  174 
Syria  and  Egypt,  conquest  of,  by  the 
Ottomans,  1516,  72 

TANUCCI,  BERNARDO,  ministry  of,  504 

Tartaglia,  Italian  mathematician,  158 

Tassoni,  Alessandro,  works  of,  379 

Tavannes,  Gaspard  de  Saulx  de,  Marshal 
of  France,  victory  of,  at  Jarnac,  1569, 
224 

Taxation ,  in  France  during  the  eighteenth 
century,  489,  492  ;  of  North  American 
colonies,  results  of,  449 

"  Tea-party,"  Boston,  449 

Temple,  Sir  William,  380 

Terouanne,  destruction  of,  by  Charles  V., 
1553,  112 

Teschen,  treaty  of,  1779,  433,  465,  514 

Test  Bill,  English,  passage  of,  1673,  35° 

Tetzel,  Johann,  and  the  sale  of  indul- 
gences, 163 

Theatins,  order  of,  creation  of,  1524,  192 

Thirty  Years'  War,  cause  of,  271  :  events 
leading  up  to,  267  ;  results  of,  283 

Thirty-nine  Articles,  adoption  of,  1562, 
183 

Thurn,  Count  of,  Utraquists  and,  271 

Tilly,  John  Tzercias,  Count  of,  military 
operations  of,  during  the  Thirty  Years' 
War,  273 

Tippoo  Sahib,  conquest  of,  by  the  Eng- 
lish, 1799,  445 

Titian,  works  of,  152 

Torgau,  union  of  Reformed  princes 
formed  at,  1526,  167 

Torquemada,  Thomas  de  45 

Torstenson,  Leonard,  Count,  military  suc- 
cesses of,  281 

Toulon,  battle  of,  1744,  420 

Tournefort,  Joseph  Pitton  de,  384 

Tower  of  London,  30 

Towton,  battle  of,  and  flight  of  the 
queen,  1461,  31 


Traventhal,  treaty  of,  1700,  391 

Trent,  Council  of,  1545-62,  109,  169,  195  ; 

causes  of  long  recess  of,  1552-62,  196; 

results    of,    195,  200  ;    transfer   of,   to 

Bologna,  1546,  196 
Trianon,  Grand-,  cost  of,  378 
Triple  alliance  of  The  Hague,  1668,  340 
Tripoli,  conquest  of,   by   Dragout,  1551, 

104 
Trivulcio,     Giovanni     J.,     Marquis     of 

Vigevano,    Italian  Marshal  of  France, 

81,  89 

Tudor  dynasty,  founding  of,  33 
Tuileries,  palace  of,  construction  of,  377 
Turenne,    Henri    de   Tour  d'Auvergne, 

Viscount  of,  defeat  of,  at  Marienthal, 

1645,  2^2  :  Dunkirk  captured  by,  1658. 

318  ;     Conde    and,    317  ;   invasion    of 

France  by,  1650,  316  ;     last    campaign 

of,  1675,  342  ;  successes  of,  in  Germany, 

1648,  283 

Turgot,  Anne  R.  J.,  ministry  of,  511 
Turkey,  Austria  and,  war  between,  1787, 

507  ;   Russia  and,  1768,    463  ;    Russia 

and,  war  between,  1695,  388.     See  also 

OTTOMAN  EMPIRE 
Tuscany,  devastation  of,  by  Giovanni  de 

Medici,   1554,  112;  reforms   in,  in   the 


eighteenth  century,  505 
"Twentieth"  tax  in  France,  492 


"V,  505 
in  Franc 
Type,  movable,  invention  of,  138 


ULRICA  ELEANORA,  Queen  of  Sweden, 
accession  of,  1720,  395 

Unigenitus,  bull,  401 

United  States,  debt  of,  to  France,  450 ; 
foundation  of,  446 

Universities,  European,  revival  and  estab- 
lishment of,  fifteenth  century,  140 

Upsal,  victory  of  Gustavus  I.  at,  1521, 
171 

Utraquists,  outbreak  of,  under  the  Count 
of  Thurn,  1618,  271 

Utrecht,  Congress  of,  1711,  361  :  treaties 
of,  1713,  362;  treaties  of,  recognition 
of  the  King  of  Prussia  under,  411 

VALLISNERI,  ANTONIO,  scientific  work  of, 

476 

Valtellina,  revolt  of,  1624,  259 
Vanloo,  Carle,  works  of,  483 
Vareta,  peace  of,  1790,  466 
Vassy,  massacre  of  Protestants  at,  1562, 

220 
Vatican   library,  rebuilding  of,  by  Pope 

Sixtus  V.,  199 
Vauban,  Sebastien  le  Prestre  de,  Marshal 

of  France,  Strasburg  fortified  by,  344 
Vaucelles,  treaty  of,  1556.  112 
Vaudreuil,  Louis  P.  de  Rigaud,  Marquis 

of,  campaigns  of,  in   Canada,   1756-60, 

410 
Vauvenargues,  Luc  de  Clapiers,  Marquis 

of,  481 

Vega,  Lopez  de  la,  works  of.  379 
Velasquez,  Governor   of  Cuba,   rebellion 

of,  against  Cortes,  1520,  126 
Vendome,    Louis  J.,   Duke  of,   military 

successes  of,  1709-10,  360 


540 


INDEX. 


Venice,  alliance  of,  with  Soule'iman  I., 
122  ;  in  the  second  half  of  the  fifteenth 
century,  59 ;  printing  established  at, 

1469,  139  ;  resistance  of,  to  Louis  XII., 
1509,   85  ;  University  of,   founding  of, 

1470,  140 

Vera  Cruz,  Mexico,  commerce  of,  six- 
teenth century,  131  ',  founding  of,  1519, 
126 

Verd,  Cape,  first  passage  of,  by  the  Por- 
tuguese, 1446,  120 

Vernet,  Claude  Joseph,  works  of,  483 

Verocchio,  Andrea,  Italian  sculptor,  148 

Verozzani.  occupation  of  Newfoundland 
by,  in  the  name  of  France,  1524,  128 

Versailles,  construction  of,  in  the  seven-     | 
teenth  century,  378  ;  treaty  of,  1756,  424 

Vervins,  peace  of,  1598,  234 

Vesalius  of  Brussels,  anatomical  dis- 
coveries of,  158 

Vespucci,  Amerigo,  injustice  of  naming 
the  continent  for,  125 

Vienna,  capture  of,  by,  Mathias  Corvinus, 
H^S,  S3  ,  siege  of,  by,  Soule'iman  I., 
1529,  101  ;  siege  of,  by  the  Bohemians, 
1619,  272;  treaty  of,  1731,  403;  treaty  of, 
1735-38,  results  of,  to  France,  408 

Viete,  French  mathematician,  158 

Villafranca,  capture  of  Prosper  Colonna 
at,  89 

Villars,  Louis  H.,  Duke  of,  Marshal  of 
France,  military  operations  of,  1709,  360 

Villaviciosa,  battle  of,  1710,  360 

Villeroi,  Francois  de  Neufville,  Duke  of, 
Marshal  of  France,  military  operations 
of,  in  Germany,  1701-06,  359 

Vinci,  Leonardo  da,  invited  to  France  as 
an  engineer,  by  Francis  I.,  1516,  137  ; 
masterpieces  of,  140,  151 

Vives,  scholar  of  the  sixteenth  century, 
146 

Volta,  Alessandro,  scientific  work  of,  473, 

Voltaire,  Francois  M.  Arouet,  called,  on 
the  government  of  France  in  the  eigh- 
teenth century,  501  ;  works  of,  478 

WALDENSES,  massacre  of,  1545,  178 

Wallenstein,  Albrecht,  Count  Waldstein, 
assassination  of,  1634,  278  ;  military 
operations  of,  during  the  Thirty  Years' 
War,  275  ;  removal  and  recall  of,  1630- 
32,  276 

Walloon  provinces  of  the  Netherlands, 
Batavian  provinces  and,  conflict  be- 
tween, 1577-81,  210 

Walpole,  Robert,  Earl  of  Oxford,  ministry 
°f>  435 

War  of  the  Roses,  28 


Warsaw,  defense  of,  by  Charles  Gustavus, 
1656,  325  ;  diet  of,  1773,  and  the  parti- 
tion of  Poland,  464 

Wartburg,  castle  of.  Luther  at,  166 

Warwick,  Richard  Nevil,  Earl  of,  the 
King-maker,  intrigues  and  execution 
of,  30-34 

Washington,  George,  American  revolu- 
tion afld,  450  ;  in  the  French  and  In- 
dian war,  423  ;  last  years  of,  456 

Watt,  James,  inventor  of  the  steam 
engine,  474 

Watteau,  Antoine,  works  of,  483 

Weslau,  treaty  of.  410 

Westeras,  States  General  of,  1524,  separa- 
tion from  the  Catholic  Church  author- 
ized by,  172 

Westphalia,  treaties  of,  1648,  283 

Wexford,  massacre  at,  under  Cromwell, 
1649,  303 

Whigs,  English,  Charles  II.  and,  350 

White  Mountain,  battle  of,  1620,  273 

Whitelocke,  Bulstrode,  380 

Willaert,  Adrian,  founder  of  the  first 
school  of  music,  157 

William  III.,  King  of  England,  accession 
of,  1689,  354  ;  and  the  Spanish  succes- 
sion, 357  ;  death  of,  1702,  358  ;  Declara- 
tion of  Rights  signed  by,  1689,  354  ; 
French  driven  from  Holland  by,  1672, 
342  ;  landing  of,  in  England,  1688,  353  ; 
recognition  of,  by  Louis  XIV.,  357 

William,  the  Silent,  of  Nassau,  Prince  of 
Orange,  assassination  of,  1584,  210  ; 
character  of,  209 

Wishart,  George,  burning  of,  179 

Witchcraft  delusion  in  Europe,  157 

Witt,  John  de,  murder  of,  342 

Worcester,  battle  of,  1651,  305 

Worms,  diet  of,  53  ;  Luther  at,  166 

Wurtemberg.  Ulnch,  Duke  of,  reinstated 
by  the  Reformers,  1534,  167 

W'uitzen,  treaty  of,  1536,  106 

XIMENES,  Archbishop  of  Toledo,  adminis- 
tration of,  in  Castile,  47 

YORK,  RICHARD  PLANTAGENET,  DUKE 
OF,  intrigues  and  death  of,  29 

York  and  Lancaster,  houses  of,  War  of 
the  Roses  between,  28 

Yuste,  monastery  of,  retirement  of  Charles 
V.  to,  1556,  113 

ZAPOLI,  JOHN,  Magyar  pretender,  101,  106 
Zizim,  or  Djem,  Ottoman  prince,  murder 

of,  71 
Zwingli,    Ulrich,    first    preacher    of    the 

Reformation  in  Switzerland,  174 


PRINTED  IN  U.S.  A 


D2©9  D95 

Duruy,    Victor,    18J1-1894. 
$  Histery  «f  medern  times, 
from  the   fall   ®f 
Constantinople  to  the 
French  revolution; 


A     000  594  745     2 


